Peaks and Troughs!

Pictures of my tritastic birthday, 30 but faster than I was when I was 20!!

First race back, 2nd place at Silverstone duathlon, not too shabby.

Good to be back on the podium. 3rd place at the final round of the National Ranking Series.



The infamous Box Hill. 5th Place at the 20th Anniversary addition of the Ballbuster.

Long time no blog I know. Its certainly been a roller coaster these last few months. After my last post ive been through a bit of a rough patch and bad form and in the end was just flogging it to death for no return. I suffered with breathing difficulties at Wimbleball and was as a result put on a steroid inhaler as I seem to react really badly to the pollen and its not the first time its happened. So after another setback I struggled to regain form and in the words of Austin Powers I "lost my mojo". The problem I think was getting so up for New Orleans earlier in the year I couldn't deal mentally and physically with the disappointment after being in such good shape so ended up training for the sake of it and really should have backed off. On the plus side I had a great 30th birthday did win the Harwich triathlon wining a holiday to France and got 3rd at Northampton but wasn't right. My back was niggling me every race and got to August with no enthusiasm or form and wounded so decided to back off and just tick over and take a mental and physical break.

So this second phase of the season has been dedicated to the duathlon circuit, finding my mojo again and I have had results that prove things are moving in the right direction, but its all about next year now. I was particularly pleased with my result at Box Hill in the Ballbuster as being the 20th year anniversary the field was loaded! 9 former winners in total not to mention vaious international triathletes and duathletes, it was some burn up. I took everyones advice and took the first run real easy but made the mistake and blasted into the lead on the first lap of the bike and paid the price, but I took a gamble which might of paid off, it maybe cost me a couple of places but better to try these things and fail than not at all.

This year is not done and dusted yet so watch this space, ive something big on the horizon!

Change!

Swim Bike Run

Long time since my last post I know! Well June is all about change for me, i'm about to enter the third decade of my life (30 shit!) which has prompted me to sit back take stock and work out where i'm heading and make a few changes.

New Orleans was a fantastic experience and one I will never forget but I came away extremely disappointed with the result and nearly cracked. I stumbled over the finish line into the arms of a medic and was whisked away to the medic tent and put on a drip for an hour. I made the simple mistake of not arriving in America in enough time to acclimatise and come race day the temperature had cranked up and we were faced with 99% humidity and I just couldn't cope. From the start of the swim I tried to go off as hard as possible and from the first breath I took I just couldn't seem to get enough oxygen on board and found it hard to breathe. Tried to play catch up on the bike going off very quickly but suffered coming back and couldn't put together a good run as a result. I ended up 21st professional out of 32.

Despite my lack of preparation with the conditions its made me realise that my task racing as a pro and working full time is probably too much of an ask and its just not a level playing field racing against guys that are full time athletes or only work part time. So as of next week I am regrettably leaving Hunters, who have been my employer for the last 7 years who I would like to thank for their support, to start a new job in Highgate working for another agent called Barnard Marcus who are going to employ me on a more flexible basis allowing me more time to train which will hopefully allow me to bridge the gap in the professional ranks and achieve what I feel i'm capable of. So i'm excited and optimistic about what will be possible now.

I have had a few more outings since New Orleans including the Tri Force Where Tri where I had a pretty average swim and was going well on the bike until my front tyre blew, turns out I was inflating them too hard! Anyway I rolled back into transition and ran a very swift 6k off the bike and still finished the race, it was more for fun than anything. My attention recently has turned to time trialing on the bike and ive had some good form finishing 2nd by 1sec at round 3 of Brickendon and winning round 5 also by 1 sec. The result though I am most chuffed with was finishing 4th in the Norland Combine on a wet and windy Sunday with a PB of 1:55:39 for 50miles, to finish 4th in a good quality time trial like this up against pure cyclists is very pleasing indeed! Last night I managed to shave 6 seconds off my course record round Colney Heath at the tri force midweek TT.

My attention at the moment is focused toward 70.3 UK in 10 days time. My new working arrangements unfortunately won't come in time for this but i'm still hopeful of putting together a good result after mechanical failure last year. After that I have quite a few tri's planned and hope to start getting some wins for the team under my belt.

New Orleans here I come!

http://www.ironmanneworleans.com/

Well after an eventful winter I am now just under 4 weeks away from my first big race of the season which will be 70.3 New Orleans. I have 2 weeks left of hard training before I start my taper and despite the worst weather this winter in the UK for years I think I have made progress under the guidance of Fiona at Tri Europe http://www.triathloneurope.com/. Having the benefit of a season already behind us of working together we have been able to really concentrate on what we know actually works for me.

My track record thus far in any Ironman branded race has not been good. Last year I raced Austria when I shouldn't have after suffering a nasty cough and chest infection, in hindsight I should have never got on the start line and at UK I still wasn't in great shape but couldn't finish due to mechanical failure. But its not been all doom and gloom as I finished the season in the prize money at the Home D Ferro in Ibiza and mixed it with some big names in Lisbon so I know i can do it, third time lucky I hope!

Ive recently linked up with a new swim squad. In recent years ive let my swimming go with it being less important in long races. But now i'm racing as a pro I really need to be as competitive as possible so I have upped my game and been swimming with some very fast youngsters. Its certainly paying off and I am swimming times I didn't think were possible whilst training for two other sports. During the second Tri Europe camp I put myself on the line and did a 400m time trial in my wetsuit and was surprised though delighted to swim 4:46 with no dive! My previous best which was with a dive was 4:58 so i'm hoping this will pay back a lot of time over 1900m.

Despite having a couple of weeks off running due to a slight niggle with my achilles I seem to be still running better than ever and am confident I have at least maintained if not improved upon the 32:42 min 10k I ran at Christmas. I was honoured to be picked to run for Hertfordshire but unfortunately had to decline due to it not fitting in my schedule.

In action during the North Road Hardriders

The North Road Hardriders was my first competitive outing for the team this year. It was a big eye opener to see how competitive it was, some of the best riders in the country turned out for what has been a very well established race and now classed as a classic. I rode 90sec quicker than last time I rode this course in 2007 which is of course progress, but a little disillusioned to finish 20th! My time would have been good enough for 9th in 2007 so that just shows you the class of field this year. Anyway I can hide behind the fact i'm training for three sports and not one!

Testing at the University of Essex

Lab testing has showed that I am able to produce more power than last year though am not quite as efficient in terms of oxygen up take and heart rate which we think is down to not being able to get many miles in on the road due to the harsh winter. Hopefully this is set to improve with the better weather, lets face it the weather can't have got any worse!

So on the whole i'm happy and optimistic about New Olreans. I realise i'm probably going to be one of the few pros with a day job and am not going to be challenging Macca and co but I do think I can be competitive and my dream of securing a slot for the world champs is possible, what will be will be!

Happy New Year!! 1st Jan 2009 a win and course record!!

Final descent to the finish!

A nice bottle of Moet which will be kept on ice until the first big win of the year is nailed!

Well its been a great start to the year. I knew after getting over the lurgy that I was in good running shape after my 10k a few days ago and my best track session to date on Tuesday. I actually think I can go a lot quicker than I did last weekend as I still reckon I was carrying a bit of a chest infection so things are looking better than they have ever been before running wise at this time of year. The next goals for my running are the county champs next weekend where my aim is to make the county team which is easier said than done with the standard of running being so high in Herts at the moment. Following that I am racing the Wokingham Half Marathon where my goal is to break 70min, even if I don't then i'm sure I will smash my PB!

I spent New Years Eve over in Teddington with Fiona Moorehead-Lane (my coach), hubby Rob and Rav and Suhela Dihegi and little one Eva. Anyway nothing too hard core just 4 or 5 beers (which is a lot for me!) and some Wii action after midnight, two hours later still playing! well I say playing I was actually being given a golf and baseball lesson, but tennis I rock!

So anyway not best race prep but hey you can't be no fun on New years eve. The race is call The Knacker Cracker have a read and you will see whyhttp://www.trionium.com/knackercracker/ The course goes up different parts of the infamous Box Hill with a mixture of mainly trails a bit of mud and a tiny bit of road. The descents are so steep if you get them wrong you won't stop rolling! and a couple of times I actually had to use my hands to stop falling over. I would hate to do this race on a wet year!

Training with my new buddies has got me in the habit of going off very quick whenever I run and hold on. This race was no different, straight to the front up the first hill and kept running until I couldn't hear my chasers breathing anymore. I took the descents very easy so as not to do anything silly and concentrated on putting time into my rivals on the climbs. The final climb was by far the worst and I was warned about this but did I listen, nope.

It was great to see so many in fancy dress from a Masai warrior to the tin man, maybe next year! Well done to Fiona who was 3rd woman after not really doing much training since Busselton, I couldn't have done that of next to no training. Rob was the smart one and spent the morning on the golf course.