A PROUD mum with a Warrington Athletics Club background narrowly missed out on a medal in the Paralympic Games Visually Impaired Triathlon in Paris today.
Alison Peasgood, nee Patrick, competing in her third Paralympics, finished in fourth place only 13 months after giving birth to her son Logan.
In her previous two Paralympic Triathlons, she won silver in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in 2016 and was fourth in Tokyo 2020, missing the bronze by just two seconds.
Putting into training all the necessary time and effort while being a new mum is a considerable undertaking, and so to finish so close to the medals is considered a significant achievement.
“I’m just completely overwhelmed,” said Alison after today’s race at Pont Alexandre III, where she was guided around the course by Brooke Gillies.
“I didn’t think I would be here and be this competitive only a year on from having my son.
“Give me a whole year and I’ll be fully fit but I’m just so proud of Brooke for supporting me through this.
“It’s been a rollercoaster, there’s nothing you can compare it to.
“There’s days where you feel amazing, there’s days where you feel awful but ultimately no matter what I do, I know Logan is going to want to play with me.
“He’s here, probably fast asleep somewhere.”
The 36-year-old switched to triathlon 11 years ago and is coached by her husband Jack, who has himself competed in triathlon internationally and has worked as a coach for Triathlon Scotland.
She worked as a physiotherapist before becoming a full-time para athlete.
While with Warrington Athletics Club, Alison competed in a variety of track, road, cross country and mountain running events.
She won 800m gold and 1500m silver in the 2007 IBSA Championships in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and the previous year had run in the World Junior Mountain Running Championships in Bursa, Turkey, finishing in 34th place.
In today’s race, Alison, who now lives in Scotland, completed the 750m swim in sixth place with a time of 15mins 38secs.
After a transition of 65secs, she set off on the 20km cycle stage and moved up to fifth place with 31mins 31secs.
For the run, after a further transition of 41secs, she clocked 20mins 26secs to give her a total time of 1hr 9mins 21secs.
With the time factoring to level up the differing impairments, her time was adjusted to 1hr 6mins 50secs – which was 52 seconds outside of the bronze medal position.
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