Tri Series - Kinloch race report - Part II

THE BIKE 37.16 HR Ave 91% HR Max 95%

The bike was going to be tough business, but I was quite high and happy with my swim and T1 so I kept the good spirits and hammered the first 3km. Reado and I have sort of talked about me hanging on to him on the bike as soon as he passed me. I tried and it worked, for about 10 min I had him in sight but could se the gap getting bigger and bigger. The good news is that while I was concentrated on that I kept passing people and not getting passes so much. Then it was hills time and I did my best to keep going. A guy in a P3 and a young fella stuck to me so we kind of kept each other honest going up and down the next 10km. A few known faces went past me, it was surprisingly late when my other mate, Martin, cought me. He was on a mission and quite bummed about his swim, we talked for 20 secs and he flew away. At the turnaround I was 50th or so out of all males.

Coming down the hills I was as careless as I could and I’m happy to report to have gone past 5 or 6 people, a couple of lightweight kids and a few big boys. We came back into town and TT’d our way through T2, a couple of more passed me and I passed another couple. The legs were full of ants, but I knew that it would be a matter of minutes before the race was finished.

THE RUN 18.20 HR Ave 93% HR Max 98%

T2 was again fast and furious, and out I was pounding the pavement. The hills had taken a toll on me, I could not sprint out of T2 like some other races, and the turnover was pretty low. I got into a better rhythm after 500m and started eating my way through the pac-man that was the Kinloch run course. A young guy passed me halfway through the first lap and I clawed to him for the next lap, he then surged and I responded, but run out of legs to keep going. The last km I got a second wind and left all I had on the run. It helped me to jump from 50th out of the bike to 28th overall.. which is not bad. But I wouldn’t rate this run as one of my best. I finished in a total time of 1.07.19 which got me into 6th in the age group.

THE BALANCE

It was a good race on a gorgeous town. My secret objective was to get a placing, but there was a lot of ambition in that statement. In order to get a placing I needed at least a minute on the bike and 30 to 40 seconds on the run. Are those objectives achievable? I believe they are, it’s a matter of working harder the next time. Was there any mitigating factors? Maybe: I did a race on Tuesday, and a full on TT on Thursday, and I didn’t have any days off for 10 days straight before the race…. That has to show at some point.

How did I feel after? I felt OK right after, now I feel really happy. There’s good signs in the way the HR shows the approach to the race. The incremental efforts allowed me to have some legs for the last bit of the run, although the race was not lost there, it is a good thing to know. The national champs for Oly distance are 4 weeks away, and given the current fitness it could be easily said that there is endurance in the swim, bike and run to make a better effort.

THE PHOTOS

Training for a dive start

out in the course recce

swim practice in the great lake taupo, with Nat



Race face, and a wetsuit full of wee