24/11/08 - Sussex Sports Personality 2008!
I had a nice surprise this weekend, by winning the Sussex Sports Personality of the Year at the annual awards dinner hosted by the SCSP at the Brighton Hilton Metropole. I'm not sure who voted for me (though I thank them for their solidarity nonetheless :D !), but they clearly haven't spent much time with me recently...I AM BORING! I have less personality that a worn out pair of swimming trunks, surely everyone knows that?! Even my hot date for the evening (ahem, Todd) wanted to vote for someone else, and he only came because I was the only person he knew with a spare ticket!
Apart from that excitement, everything is going swimmingly (except for swimming, we are doing far too much of that!). Training is all good, and having another household of athletes so close is making shared cooking responsbilites a joy (read: Bitty and Soph are stopping me getting food poisoning from my own concoctions).
A little bit of sun would go down nicely though...shame...!
29/09/08 - FINAL WORLD CUP RANKING - 6th
Just a quick note to say that now the World Cup season is officially over following the final race of the year in Mexico at the weekend, the end of year standings have been released. I managed to remain comfortably within the top 10 at number 6!
29/09/08 - 2008...DONE...RANKED 5th in the WORLD!
The season is over! It has been a LONG 6 months, and I am glad to say that I have finally finished my final race of the year. After a season filled with more ups and downs than I care to remember, I am sitting proud in 5th place in the World Rankings, have experienced the pressures of the Olympic Games in more detail than I thought possible, and have my first ever World Cup medal hanging in my kitchen!
After the Beijing experience, I returned home for a couple of weeks of training, before packing my bags with Bodyworks team-mate Todd Leckie and coach Glenn Cook for a quick jolly across the pond to race a couple of non-drafting races in the States with my premier sponsor Herbalife! I had a great time learning what the 'other' side of triathlon feels like, and after a ridiculously steep learning curve in the LA Triathlon (7th), I managed to take my new knowledge and transfer it to a 2nd at the Malibu Triathlon the next week, beating Hunter Kemper (7th at Olympics) and Matt Reed (5th at World Champs) while I was at it! Luckly J-Lo decided to race the 'Classic' distance race on the Sunday instead of the Olympic distance on the Saturday...I'm not sure how I would have coped with the distraction!
I then returned to Europe for the final time, squeezing in a few hard session before wheeling my poor battered body out one final time for the Lorient World Cup in North France. I had the 3rd quickest run, finishing in 6th place, which managed to bump me up to 5th in the World Cup Rankings with only one race to go (which I have decided not to do).
I will now a couple of weeks off training as my annual break, before returning to the chalk face in late October to prepare for another season and another Olympic season.
I would like to take this opportunity to thank all of my sponsors for their continued support after this drama-filled season. It means a lot!!
JULY 2008 - MID SEASON REPORT...FIRST EVER WORLD CUP PODIUM!
What a rollercoaster! Well, firstly, I think it's fair to say that the Madrid World Cup didn't go quite to plan. Due to my injuries last year, Madrid was my sole chance at qualifying for the 2008 Olympics. After a strong start to the season, I gave myself 5 weeks after the race in Pontevedra to build up to Madrid. From day 1 my preparation was messed up, as I kicked off this preparation by missing a week though illness! After that, my training was (to put it kindly!) mixed, and I was constantly dogged by bad sessions where my lungs were stuggling to keep up with my legs. For this (and other) reasons, Madrid was a disaster, and was the first (and so far only) race I have ever had to drop out of. It was a crushing was to end my Olympic dream, especially as literally a handful of days later tests cofirmed that I had insufficient asthma medication...but there you go.
Having been offered (and accepting) the reserve spot for the Olympic team, I decided to drag myself out of being depressed about Madrid and getting stuck in with some races. The first was the World Champs in Vancouver, where I managed a solid 15th at my first ever Elite World Champs. I then went to Austin, Texas to train with the Olympic Squad before grabbing an 11th at the Des Moines World Cup (if the name rings a bell it may be because THIS is the race where the winner nets a cool $200,000...hence the strong field)!
By this time I was starting to find some form again, and two weeks later I managed to get my first World Cup Podium at the Hamburg World Cup, finishing just behind the 2007 World Champ and the (future!) 2008 Olympic Champ...not too shabby! I was able to back this up 2 weeks later with a 5th at the Tiszaujvaros World Cup...before stumbling round the National Champs a very fatigued 4th after a crazy block of hardcore racing!
It was then finally time to go to Korea and then Beijing for the pre-Olympic preparations...my job was to get myself ready to be called up to the team at a moments notice. I'm sure many of you know the eventual outcome (for those who don't, I wasn't called up despite team member Tim Don being too ill to finish the race)...which was on the one hand frustrating, but also a good learning experience. I guess it was just disappointing for all involved that both Tim and myself were denied the chance of having a race, though for different reasons.
28/04/08 - EARLY SEASON RESULTS
Wow, it's still April and I have already got 3 races under my belt.
My season started with a trip over to Australia to prepare for the first World Cup of the year in a place called Mooloolaba, on the Sunshine Coast. I travelled over to Aus a couple of weeks before the race, to leave myself sufficient time to adjust to the time difference and climate. After a week or so on the Gold Coast with Al (Brownlee) and Will (Clarke), we travelled up to the Sunshine coast to prepare for the race. I had a pretty decent swim, and was out in the front group. Unfortunately, we weren't able to stay away, and got caught by the chase group, including most of the strong runners. After a fairly comfortable bike, I got a fairly decent position into T2... or so I thought. I soon realised that most of the strong runners were out of T2 ahead of me, requiring me to run a very fast first 3km to get back in touch. I soon found myself in a small grouo with Tim Don and Bevan Docherty, feeling comfortable. the group split in the latter stages, and despite being in 4th place at the top of the last hill, my legs fianlly gave out and I had to settle for a very pleasing 6th.
The next week I raced in New Plymouth. My race preparation was...interesting! Myself and Alistair found ourselves rather secluded, staying in a cottage at the wrong end of town. After such a good race the week before, I wanted to test myself on the swim, so went out like a hare, leading out the rest of the field as we approched the first buoy. I had been a bit over-enthusiastic in this first 300m, and really suffered in the rest of the swim. Onto the bike, I didn't feel that great, so just concentrated on holding my place in the lead group, and hence missed a breakaway that I should have been able to get into. I had a terrible T2, so exited T2 way down. I had a very strong first 6km on the run, and managed to run through a lot of the field, and held on in the last 4km to a solid 14th...though I really should have been pushing for a podium finish!
The final of my 3 races was supposed to be a nice sunny trip to Spain with Todd. As it turned out, there was torrential rain. Having survived (and swam well) in the swim in 12 degree water (!), I got onto the bike and felt really strong, despite losing feeling in both fingers and toes in the rain and cold, and losing my bottle on lap one after my entire bottle cage snapped off! The end was in sight, with 10km of the bike to go, when I heard the dreaded "psssst" of a puncture. I had to ride 2km up a hill to the wheel stop, and by the time my frozen fingers had put the wheel in, the 2nd group had caught up. I jumped on the back, and immidiately tried to attack, but soon realised it wasn't going to happen, as my brake was rubbing on the tyre (!) of the replacement wheel...which made the remainder of the bike very hard and dangerous! After a numb transition, I got onto the run, and apart from very tired legs after riding with a rubbing brake, I felt OK, and ran myself up to 7th...which was a nice was to salvage a pretty horrendous race!
It's now about 4 weeks 'til the Madrid World Cup, the final Olympic Qualifier, so I'm going to try to keep my head down between now and then, and then see what happen's en Espana in one month.
28/02/08 - DRESSED FOR SUCCESS with MAZDA
A couple of months back Tim Don and I did a photoshoot for the Mazda magazine 'Zoom Zoom' at a rather chilly Dorney Lake. For those of you who don't drive Mazda cars (shame on you!!), you can see some of the photos and the article at the Mazda website www.mazda.co.uk.
There's a nice interview I did with Annie Emmerson the other day on Tri 247, at www.tri247.com.
Don't forget to check out this month's Men's Health, as it is the final issue of the 3-part article about me and (more importantly!) my Mazda CX-7! You can find out more at www.mensfitness.co.uk/triathlon.
21/06/07 - TRI STORE hook me up AGAIN! GIRO IONUS!
Thanks to the guys at the Tri Store for sorting me out with an awesome Giro Ionus bike helmet for 2008! www.thetristore.com.
Just an update to say that training is going well, with lots of cycling miles, nowhere to hide on the swim (thanks to training partner James (Bitty) Adams lighting it up in EVERY session!) and the long running rehab finally bearing fruit. At the weekend it was the Sussex County Cross-Country Champs, which I managed to steal ahead of Gavin Thompson (ran 10km for England at 2006 Commonwealth Games).