Hamburg + London & time for some rest!

 2 weeks ago I was packing my bags and heading to Hamburg for the World Triathlon Series sprint race. It was certainly a nostalgic experience and one which I had eagerly anticipated since the beginning of the season. Very happy that I had been racing well enough to get a start, I returned to the magnificent city for the first time since 2007. 5 years ago I came to Hamburg for my first Junior World Championships as a 16 year old. I was young and naive, very new to the sport- it was the beginning of many things I treasure and still reflect on today. I met new people, experienced a different culture, I was surrounded by Australia’s elite and my love and passion for racing was sparked. 

I placed 2nd to Hollie Avil that year and I distinctly remember the crowd, the incredible atmosphere they created was overwhelming and exciting. That course has remained one of my favourites throughout all these years and it has not changed since 2007. 

The water temperature was a chilly 17, wetsuits necessary. I was happy with my swim, exiting the water at the back of the front group. YES!! Running up the ramp with Erin Densham right beside me, I knew I must have been in a pretty good position. A 47 second transition 1- struggling to get my wetsuit off meant I missed the first pack, while others who swim a little slower than me making it. Back in the chase pack once again, I did the majority of the work with Anne Haug. I have been happy with the cycling strength I have gained throughout the season, putting in the kms and hard work. Funnily enough it was training partner, Emma Moffat who was driving the front pack- not an easy task to hunt her down!


 Last lap, I was feeling the fatigue although we made big gains on the front pack, the rear of the group only about 150m away heading into T2. It was a two lap 2.5km run course and after suffering a little on the 1st lap, I started to feel much better and made greater gains the 2nd time around. Most of the girls in the front bike group were out of reach, so I was satisfied coming in 7th place. Keeping up my record, with that being my 6th top ten from 6 WTS race starts. 

After Banyoles, Kitzbuhel, Tiszy then Hamburg, I was always planning to have a rest at some stage. I kept training for about 10 days with Moffy back in Aix as she made her final preparations for the Olympic Games. I am currently in London, now on a mid-season break, discovering the city (ie getting incredibly lost) and soaking up the Olympic atmosphere. I thought it was important to take some time to let my body recover and rejuvenate, allowing myself to build back up to perfrom towards the end of the season.


Anticipating a great race from the girls on Saturday, it will be very interesting. I'll be looking to see where ladies such as Spirig, Ryf and Haug come out of the water...girls who are willing to make things happen on the bike if they are back in the swim, playing catch up, or strengthening an already motivated front group.
Thanks for reading, go the Aussies.

Light Aircraft flight with Moffy over our training base in France. Very scary but awesome experience

Some amazing views over Lac du Bourget

Tiszy Wolrd Cup- Words with Wilson, Special Edition

I have just come back from my race in Hamburg, although reports from my previous weekend at the Tiszaujvaros World Cup have yet to be blogged, so thought I better start there. This post is a special Dan Wilson edition, my weekends proceedings written from his perspective. I am very pleased to have him guest blog or me and have defiantely come off the winner, Dan's literacy skills are far superior then mine. Thankyou for the continual support throughout the season and for all of the kind words after the race, they are always much appreciated. Enjoy the read...

Greeting friends, and may I initiate by articulating what an honor it is to have my humble ramblings here on the hallowed turf of your host’s blog. Charged with the task of chronicling quite a dominant weekend by Ash ‘Please Be’ Gentle, relax and satisfy your narrative nourishment, as we shall allow our reenactment to be as effusive as Gentles second World Cup win deserves.

Minor hiccups during race preparation are the irksome olive pits that plague most of the triathlon cognoscenti from time to time. In Gentle’s case, by mid-week before Tiszy, trouble was afoot, literally it would seem. After a brief stoush with some strapping tape, Gentle’s foot had come off second best, leaving an allergic reaction causing a blister that would have had the cast of Saw gagging.

Pre-race omens were not all bad however, with amateur prognosticator Gentle having dreams involving miracle breaks on the bike, instigated by her superlative bike skills avoiding mass crashes that hindered the rest of the field, whilst leaving our protagonist riding unscathed. Fortunately for the health of the majority of the female field, these Nostradamus-esque predictions failed to materialise, however the visions were enough to have Gentle captivated by the bike primes, which we shall get to later in this account.

Thus, with no further prophecy’s expounded from the week, our departure on Thursday had come up quickly. Also, ‘Coming up quickly’ was teammate Boxy’s dinner, breakfast, and eventually stomach lining, and unfortunately for the little fella, put paid to his hopes of racing on the weekend, and was lumped with the distinctly unenviable task of traveling to Hungary whist vomiting with the regularity of a metronome. Needless to say, we kept a safe, yet empathetic distance from Boxy during transit.

Upon arrival to Tiszy, race briefing quickly revealed the intricacies of the avant-garde format being trialled this year. The women were faced with racing a sprint distance Semi-Final on the Saturday, needing a top 12 (+ 1 fastest non-qualifier) to qualify through to the final on Sunday, whilst the rest were sent home for an early shower, and presumably, cheering through somewhat gritted teeth on Sunday.

So - onto Semi-Final 1! The swim was 750m, requiring 3(!) laps in somewhat murky water. Given that the first buoy was a ‘generous’ 114 metres from the start line, most were predicting blood at the first turn, evident by the 1st aid officers, paramedics, and most unsettlingly, a priest situated by the swim course. Choosing to give the rest of the field a fighting chance, Gentle (by her own admission) had a dog’s breakfast of a start, and did everything but swim backwards from the start line. Head-start given, some strong swimming and tactical nous, saw Gentle enter T1 nothing more than a few firm pedal strokes from the front bunch, after which the bike ensued without incident, and a large pack arrived at T2.

Onto the run, and tactical smarts dictated nothing more than a canter was in order, as saving some dry tinder for tomorrow was becoming paramount, and Gentle cruised along in 3rd gear, yet still claimed the heat from teammate Charlotte McShane, along with the entire Aussie female contingent, featuring Ash Bailie, Tamsin Mona-Vale and Nat Van-Coevorden.
After a quick massage and ice bath cold enough to make a penguin shiver, the girls were then treated to be able to watch the first of the ‘proper’ races of the afternoon - the mens race (relax ladies, I’m only joking, no chauvinism here...).

Following a well earned sleep, Sunday brought the cynosure of the weekend, with the Final deciding the recipients of the hardware on offer. After some good natured sledging on the efficiency of Gentle’s start, a slightly more focussed pontoon dive saw Gentle with a start Phelps would have been proud of. Having some work to do early on the bike, the ‘Walton Polish’ (i.e. creating tough-as, super strong athletes) had clearly rubbed off on Gentle, as she towed 3 other athletes up the join the main pack. From my vantage point, high on level 3 of the Hotel Phoenix, Gentles arrival caused some drooping of shoulders and gnashing of teeth among some of the lesser credentialed runners. 

Unfortunately, I couldn’t quite make out some of the erratic riding and careless saliva disposal that several post race reports described, which would have made for even more entertaining viewing. Sadly despite a Sagen-like attack on the second last lap, Gentle failed to capture her coveted bike prime, getting rolled by a pair of Russians over the last few metres, and thus initiating a Wilson vs Gentle competition to be first to claim a prime this season. Or next season. Or career. These primes are hard, it could take (at least me) a while.

Once on to the run, it was a good-old-fashioned-running duel, with Gentle leading from Dutch youngster Maaike Caelers, who clung like a limpet until the final lap, where Gentle was finally able to break clear to add her second World Cup win to a rapidly expanding resume.
All that was left for Gentle was to splash some Champagne on some Hungarian locals, pocket the hardware, and take $20 euro off me by accepting my challenge to moonwalk the stage to collect her winnings, gaining arguably more cheers from the crowd than during the race.

It was a weekend of hard, fast and exciting racing over the novel format, and one sure to be a hit with triathlon fans everywhere, and clearly a format that Gentle relished. Until the next Wilson-Gentle split album, it’s been a pleasure to guest author.

Regards,
Willy. 

Very intimidating writing for 'Words with Wilson' himself, but check out Dan's blog for my take on his weekend HERE

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.