'You're not past it' - Britain's triathlon master

Donald Brooks has won triathlon titles from sprint distance all the way up to Ironman

"Because I'm achieving what I'm achieving at the age I am I think it inspires people when they're taking the sport up in their 30's or early 40's.

"You can achieve great stuff at that age, you're not past it, there's still more to be had out there," says Donald Brooks.

And the 47-year-old should know having become one of the world's top Masters triathletes.

Having come to the sport just a decade ago he has become an 11-time British age group champion over various distances, won 10 European age group titles and nine world championships, including the last two world Ironman titles.

"It's a very addictive sport - you start small and then you're looking for the next event," the Teignmouth-based athlete explains to BBC South West.

"You're looking for the next thing you can enter, the different distances. I went from the sprint distance and I did my first Ironman or full distance triathlon only at the end of 2015.

"I knew myself I wasn't ready for it at that point, and I did OK at it, but I knew there was more to explore, so I put that on the back burner and concentrated on the standard distance, which is what we do at the Olympics.

"Then I moved onto the half-Ironman, which for me is around about a four-hour race, and I did that for a few years - I didn't get back into doing a full distance race until probably about 2021-2022, so I've only gone back into the full distance recently."

Donald Brooks took up triathlon having been a swimmer and underwater hockey player

The full distance Ironman is a 2.4-mile swim, followed by a 112-mile bike ride and ended with a full 26.2-mile marathon.

As well as becoming his age group champion at the last World Championship in the sport's spiritual home in Hawaii last month, he also finished 41st overall - beating 12 professional athletes and being in the top five of 2,300 amateurs who had qualified.

"To be doing that at my age is a good testament to my fitness," he says.

"But I think coming into the sport at a later stage I'm not picking up a lot of the injuries that some people are picking up, especially with their lower limb running injuries."

But avoiding injuries is just one reason for Brooks' success.

As a former swimmer and underwater hockey player he has developed good lung capacity which has helped his aerobic fitness. His VO2 max score - a measure of aerobic ability - is between 70 and 75.

That is 20 points more than what would be considered "excellent" for someone of his age.

"I think you have to have a natural talent, which I have, but you also have to be very disciplined with your training, your nutrition, your routine and just consistency of the training," says Brooks, who juggles 18-20 hours of training a week with working running his own company.

"You have to put a lot of miles in, you go out in a lot of bad weather

"It's just getting that session done and consistency, and if you can share that with friends and other people it can be very social - coffee rides are always great fun.

"But it's the hours you put in that pay dividends really."

So where does the motivation come for a man who seems to have won it all?

"My friend says you're riding a wave, and you don't know how long that wave's going to last, so keep riding it until you fall off," Brooks says.

"Whilst I'm winning, and whilst I'm enjoying it more so, I'll keep going and keep trying.

"But when it becomes more of a chore and I'm not enjoying it, then that'll be the time to stop."