Kitzbuhel +

So the six day turn around from Banyoles World Cup had me worried at one point, Wednesday afternoon run after the race  was one of the worst ever! Putting that out of my mind, I left Aix le Bains once again, en route to Kitzbuhel to race in my 5th Worlds Series race on the Saturday. Having 4 top 10 performances in World Series races from 4 starts, I wanted to try and keep this track record going. Once I arrived in Kitzbuhel I was immediately blown away by this little mountain town's beauty, I've always heard great things and I felt privileged to have the opportunity to experience it myself. 
 
Coming out of the water in the second group, I knew I was going to have to do some work to get myself in the race. It was definitely not the time to have a sub-par swim, as all the strong cyclists seemed to be up in the front group, incuding the likes of Spirig, Norden, Hewitt, Samuels, Groff and Harrison. Along with a few others rolling some turns at the front we ended up about 1.30minutes down off the front group coming into T2. I felt confident and quite strong on my bike, not for one mintue wanting to give up, although the gap got out to over 2 minutes at one stage! I loved the course, it's quite challenging with some climbing, fast downhills, cobblestones and some technical sections. Coming off the bike I had nothing to lose, determined to run myself into a reasonable position after pulling lots of turns on the bike. I ended the day with the fastest run split and 10th overall. I was very fortunate to have Josh come from Zurich to support me, a very nice surprise! The next day I packed up and headed to Switzerland myself to spend a few days with him, time to relax with great company!  I really enjoyed my time in Zurich, such a beautiful place, but it was goodbye to Josh once again as I headed back to my training base in Aix. In just over 2 and a half weeks I had resided in 4 different countries!
 
Here are some pictures from the last week. Thanks for reading.

Swim Start

Cobblestone corner

start of the run

last lap

Living on the lake in Zurich

Successfully found the lolly shop from last year!

Banyoles World Cup

I’m currently in the team van heading back to Aix le Bains after Banyoles World Cup yesterday. It was my first time visiting the country of Spain and Banyoles left me with a good impression. It's a very small town, with one of the main features being the picturesque lake which we swam in on Sunday. 22 degree water temperature made for a non-wetsuit swim around the two lap course. Once out of the water we had six laps on the bike which looped around the lake, with 3 laps on the run in front of the transition area. There was a small hill on the bike which we also ran to the top of on the run which broke things up a little- also a lot harder on foot! 

Fairly recently I have joined back swimming with Denis Cotterell at Miami Swim Club, consistantly working on my technique and conditioning in the water. Satisfied with my improvements in the pool, I was eager to convert this to the open water. Although I recognize some things I need to rectify and focus on next race, I am very pleased with my position out of the water on the weekend. After catching up to the main group only a few hundred metres up the road on the first lap, the pace definitely wasn’t on. I almost immediately got myself to the front of the pack and wanted people to roll through with me. The tri-cast may or may not include some footage of my more frustrated side. There were two well established swimmers up the road and although they are not recognized for strong running ability, it was unnecessary to let them get too far ahead or be in danger of chasing packs catching us. The two up front ended up with a 2 minute lead although were caught on the run during the start of the 2nd lap. 

I kept myself to the front of the bike pack and after a not so slick T2, I was out on to the run. Erin Densham got herself a blinder of a start, with Gwen Jorgensen sitting on my shoulder for the majority of the first portion of the run, very aware that Andrea Hewitt was trailing just behind us. After Gwen flew past me down the hill, I tried to match her pace and we found ourselves reeling in Erin. After Gwen had passed Erin and established herself a good lead into the finish, I just couldn’t quite catch on to Erin and was happy to finish on the podium behind these ladies after a hard fought run in the heat. I hope to be back to Banyoles, there is a very relaxed atmosphere and I enjoyed my stay. Next race for me is Kitzbuhel World Series race this Saturday, quick turn around but I've pulled up well and am eager to get racing again. I really appreciate all the messages of encouragement so far this year, all the little things count and its nice to feel supported. 

Thanks for reading

Training and Travel

I've finally made it to Aix le Bains, France. I love living in Australia and also love the fact that I'm able to travel to such beautiful places in Europe, but that doesn't mean I have to like the long haul journey. After getting off the 8 hour plane trip from Brisbane to Singapore, I'm always dreading the next 13 hour sit to London. Getting straight off the plane my muscles feel like they halve in length, which made for a pretty painful massage yesterday! Aix le Bains has been the training base for AIS triathletes for about a decade now and is in a beautiful place right near the Swiss border, only a 50 minute drive from Geneva. Although I haven't seen much of the mountains yet, it's just been low cloud cover and some rain so far!

It's been a bit over 4 weeks since San Diego and I definitely made the right decision to come back to Australia after the race. In my home environment with coach Craig and Moffy, I had a really satisfying block of training. I am heading to Banyoles World Cup this weekend and I'm excited to race again, although not really sure what to expect. I have been doing more aerobic, strength work recently but it's a long season and I achieved a couple of little goals during this time, which has given me some confidence. I plan on doing four races here in Europe before I head to America to relax with Josh, although I'll be doing all the relaxing, focus for him is Hy Vee in September. When I was in transit I was very pleased to read that Josh had placed second in Klagenfurt 5150, hard work and persistance does pay off people! Also very happy for Daniela Ryf who took out the womens race and Liz Blatchford in second. I was lucky enough to do a fair amount of training with these ladies on the Gold Coast and its nice to see that their talents could convert over to the non-drafting scene. I'll keep the blog and twitter updated with my training and travels during my overseas stint so you can follow me as you wish.

 Long ride from the Gold Coast

Josh and Moffy

Piece of the cake I made for Josh before his overseas departure :)

Klagenfurt 5150- off the front, leading from the start... as usual!

Little brother and I- family celebrating my departure ;)

San Diego

I’m going to try and keep this one short and sweet, need to save my word count for the uni assignment I should be doing right now.

We had a very smooth trip to San Diego, direct flight from Brisbane to LA then a short 2 hour car trip. After an easy week in San Diego and adjusting to the time zone, I was looking forward to racing on Friday afternoon. The weather was a lot colder than I expected, with track pants and two jumpers my attire for most of the week. Race morning it was nice and sunny and the wind was slightly warmer than previous days which was a relief for us little tri chicks. After the two lap washing machine of a swim, I exited with a fairly large group of girls. It was very borderline to whether it was going to be wetsuit or not, so without the rubber coating, I was glad to be out of the bay! The group I was in bridged to the next chase group, making it a very large pack of girls with 8 others up the road making significant time on us each lap. They had a strong group of girls working together and they were able to take full advantage of the technical bike course, man I wish I could swim like Laura Bennett!

Out on to the run it was quite clear that we were all going to be fighting to make the top 10 as the lead group finished with a gap of around 2mins and 20seconds in front of us off the bike. I took it out quite hard and felt quite comfortable. After Moffy and Haug from Germany really picked it up on the 2nd of 3 laps, I slowly dropped off the pace. Heading into the 3rd lap, I focussed on reeling in and passing another athlete who was dropping off the pace- from there I didn't look back and ran strong to the finish. Another 10th place and very happy with my result. I have shown some continual improvement and stoked to end up with the 4th fastest run, but that doesn't count when there were so many great athletes off the front on the bike! Helen Jenkins ran an amazing race and truly made it look easy. Congratulations once again to Erin for another podium finish. Laura Bennett, the most consistent performer over an incredible amount of time took home third and consequently qualified for the Olympics. Those ladies are all class and something I really aspire too. Here are some pictures from the race...more to come when I get my hands on the pictures from our emergency stopover in Hawaii- Wakiki beach happened :)

Sydney continued...

I had 5 weeks from Devonport to Sydney, I was thinking it was a fair amount of time although it definitely blew past very quickly. In this time, some mishaps occured but it's something I'm slowly getting on top of. I was a little anxious heading into Sydney, mainly due to my slightly mixed preparation. I carried some confidence from my swim and cycling sessions so once the horn went off I just let the adrenalin flow. Being in a relativey large chase pack I had some strong cyclists around me and I tried desperately to stay amongst the front group of girls. Once we caught the lead pack, it was quite difficult to move up and there was some wheel touching and close calls but I ended up moving around the outside to better position myself. If you don't have the skills and confidence within these groups you can easily be pushed around and find yourself midpack. My positioning coming into t2 wasn't ideal, but not too bad.

The first 1km of the run, everyone seems to be running way too fast!! I settled into my pace and tried to catch onto the front 10 or so girls and as soon as I thought I might be able to eventually tack on the back...they were gone :)  I sat in about 7th position for most of 10km run but had a few girls sitting on my shoulder and all but one ended up passing me within the last km. Thanks to my parents, brothers and a friend who flew from the Coast to cheer me from the sidelines, they were so loud and my eldest brother in particular got very passionate. (please leave youre shirt on next time ;)

I was very satisfied with my race and have once again have learnt a lot. I'm looking forward to continuing to string  together some good training and get my run load and intensity back to normal. A huge congratulations to team mate Erin Densham,  what an amazing race by her and I'm very happy to finish 2nd AUS chick behind her.

The day after the race the Olympic Shadow Squad were treated to a sailing trip through the Sydney Harbour. We took in some nice views but there wasn't much wind which meant for a pretty slow cruise through waters...

T

Later that eventing we ditched the jackets and trackpants for cocktail dresses for Triathlon Australia Annual Awards Dinner where I was very grateful to receive the "Chris Hewitt Emerging Athlete" award.

Thanks for reading, San Diego is next for me. Ive never been to America before so to say I'm excited would be an understatement.

Sydney

I have just arrrived home from Sydney after competing at the first World Triathlon Series (no longer called World Championship Series) event for 2012 and major selection race for the London Olympics. With a mixed preparation I was very happy to finish 10th overall and 2nd Aussie behind the winner Erin Densham. That makes it 3 top 10's in 3 World Triathlon Series starts (London, Lausanne, Sydney) which im pretty stoked about ;) I haven't seen so much as a picture which would suggest I even raced Sydney but my family and a friend flew from the Gold Coast to watch me, I had lots of friends cheering  from their tv sets and I received many kind messages....I am so grateful!!

Stay tuned, a proper blog of the weekend is to come.

GC Commonwealth Games

On Tuesday the 3rd of April it was exactly 6 years to the opening ceremony of the 2018 Commonwealth Games. We had  a small photo shoot at the Southport Pool and I was Joined by London Olympic swimmers Brenton Rickard and Cameron McAvoy, Olympic Cyclist Sara Carrigan and one of the Commonwealth Games Ambassadors.  I have a new found respect for the sport of diving as we climbed the stairs to take some pictures from the 10m platform in order to capture the amazing Gold Coast backdrop. It definately looks like a big leap down to the water and I'll remember that when I watch that event at the Olympics! 

It's extremely exciting for an athlete like myself to know that I have a major championship in my hometown in 6 years time, I'll be 27years old and hopefully competing in front of my friends and family. I definately didn't think that when I was taking a few extra pictures at Southport park that I would end up on the front page of the Bulletin!

Gold Coast Bulletin

Helping out at the 'Superkidz' race at Mooloolaba Triathlon weekend

Never too much open water practice

I'm flying to Sydney today for the first round of the World Champ Series. For all the Aussies, the race is live on On HD....the women jumping in the bay at 7.36am so tune in. I've also taken a big step in the world of social media and caved into Twitter, follow me if you like https://twitter.com/#!/AshleighGentle   I'm not too boring ;)