Well, what can I say? Blenheim did not quite go according to plan. It hurt — far more than I thought it possible to hurt in a sprint distance race, but that was probably because I knew it was all going horribly wrong.
It was my first elite race - that is, my first race among the professionals - which meant that drafting on the bike was allowed (this is where you can ride in packs, wheel to wheel).
I knew this meant it would be more of a tactical race than normal amateur racing ever is, but the grim reality of this didn't really hit home until I was in the thick of the action and it was all going badly.
My tactic for the swim had been to try to stick with the very fastest swimmers, but 200m into the race when their feet were disappearing into the distance and I was dying, I realised this was a bad idea.
I climbed out of the lake in fifth spot just ahead of Chrissie Wellington, who would go on to destroy the field in her usual style.
The fast start to the swim had taken its toll on me and as I stopped to take off my wetsuit before heading up the hill to the courtyard (transition) I saw a few girls pass me by. This was going wrong.
As I set off up the hill I made the mistake of looking at my heart rate monitor. It was flashing 170 beats per minute (bpm) which is sky high (my resting heart rate is about 38-40bpm). I desperately tried to turn all the negative thoughts in my head into positive ones, but my legs felt like lead and my chest was heaving. Not good signs.
Out on the bike course I knew I had to chase down the leaders, but chasing down Chrissie Wellington - who won the World Championships by 10 minutes last year - is a tall order. It didn't happen and instead, one girl caught me and locked onto my back wheel. The idea is to take turns on the front, but she was having none of it. Two more girls tagged on as the 20km bike continued and the Tri Chick Express towed them round for most of it. I can now categorically tell you from painful experience: this is no way to do a triathlon!
Running out of T2 (the second transition, from bike to run), those legs which felt like lead before were 10 times worse now. Running 5k has never been so painful. The three girls who'd been behind me on the bike all flew past me. I felt like I was shuffling, not running.
Somehow, things got a little better on the second lap. I passed one of the girls to go into seventh place and as I turned towards the finishing straight I heard Dickie shout at me "Think of those hills sessions!" - a reference to some painful training sessions we did last summer which involved running up Raleigh Park simulating sprint finishes. They hurt in much the same way the final 300m at Blenheim hurt, but once the finish line's in sight it's never too bad.
I have to say I was relieved when it was over. Lessons learned and all that jazz. I was disappointed with the result because I knew it could have been so much better, but there are positives to take from it: I was six minutes quicker than last year and beat team mate Sophie Whitworth, who's been at the top of the tri game for over a decade.
Regardless of all that, it's now time to box it all up and think ahead to Sunday when it's the Ellesmere Triathlon in Shropshire, the first of four qualifiers for the GB team for the World Championships. I need a top four finish to qualify, so here's hoping it all goes well...