How NOT to Fuel a Car and Mooloolaba Musings

I’m currently just re-reading and editing this blog post…..as some of you know I can struggle at life sometimes, today was a new low. I am currently sitting in my car waiting for an RACV tow-truck to pick me up. Borrowing my parents care I, being the good son I am, filled up the car. Unfortunately I only realised it was a diesel car once I had completely filled the tank with petrol. This is how I am passing the time whilst waiting for a tow truck. Anyways enough of tails of my continuing incompetence…

So what is the first thing I do once I finish a hellish two weeks of exams and major essays? Of course just write more…..I have been meaning to write something for a while, mainly because it is an enjoyable process, I love writing! Moreover it is pretty obvious which people write blogs solely to get sponsors. Second, it provides good opportunity for me to go through races in a detailed/objective way, in this case (due to indifferent results) it is was useful process of catharsis.

I decided to move my blog over to Blogger, let’s face it, Tumblr is really not an appropriate place for long (2000+ word) posts.

I am currently on my flight home to Melbourne with the first semester of my Masters at Bond complete. I have had two weekends home since the 16^th of December, so I am pretty excited! I have compiled a list of Café’s that I want to visit when I get home, more suggestions would be welcome.

After the disappointment of National Champs in Devonport (DNF, although had fastest overall bike) I went to Mooloolaba knowing full well it was my last opportunity for automatic qualification for my professional licence. Top 3 would guarantee that. Unfortunately even though Noosa, enough to qualify Devonport and Mooloolaba, I was outside the % time to the overall winner Aaron Royle (neither of the two other aforementioned races have these time cut-offs).

My preparation had been ok, I was riding well, which was a surprise since I hadn’t done one week above 300ks since early January. My swim and run training was also low (and slow), indeed I have (because of injury) only had two weeks above 50ks of running since August! 

One positive though was my body and especially calves, were feeling the best they'd felt in months. A massive thank you must go to Lianne (who doubles as a sports psych/coffee tour guide/suggester of bike routes) and the team at Gold Coast Physio for coming on board to support me. Experiences of the last few months mean I definitely do not take being 
pain/injury free for granted anymore!

Anyway I came to the startline (after a minor debacle when I wasn’t on the entry list and then given a cap which was meant for the 35-39 female age group….awks) with realistic expectation.

The swim was probably the roughest I have ever done, the large field coupled with a deep pool of swimmers, meant that it was super-congested. I gave as good as I got. On that note its always quite odd talking to people at the end of a race, their friendliness contrasted the violence a few hours before (akin to under 12’s netball, we are all pretty small). I exited the water comfortably in a large group, but about one minute behind the eventual winner. This area remains my achillies heel, if I want to step up from top 3/5 to a win I need to improve this area.

Just having a casual double-handed grope

Onto the bike I was feeling good and climbed up onto the highway at a solid pace catching and passing four or five people. The plan was to bury myself on the bike, trying to ride up to the leaders. At the 15k mark I turned around and two my annoyance I saw a pack of people 200m behind me, I was pissed! 

Unfortunately that is the reality of non-drafting races on dead-flat courses with a strong field. I let myself be caught, and wasted a lot of energy over the last 20ks trying to ‘break away’ and never allowing myself to drop out of the top 3 for fear of being busted by the draft Marshall who followed us the whole way (no cards for anyone!). The bike turned more into an ITU style race, with people bombing off the front only to be reeled back in, this had the effect of both sapping my legs (power spikes) and slowing us all down as a whole. Near the end of the ride I put in an effort to make sure I was first in transition. 

Bike time was 57.45, a new PB

I exited T2 (I had the fastest overall T2 and 3^rd fastest T1) in 4^th position, with Casey Munro (I am pretty sure he’s won a few 70.3’s professionally, Nick Hull the Aus AG Champ, and Giles Clayton who got DQ’d from Oceania Cup Race) ahead of me. By the 3k mark I was feeling really good and was clearly sitting in fourth.

The run was bloody hot! The course is a two-lap affair either up-hill or downhill, there is not much in between. With 90mins of racing already in the legs the downhills are almost more painful than the uphills. As is the case with most OD’s I seem to spend a good portion of the run questioning why I actually enjoy doing this sport! As I say to my friends I love triathlons, just not racing them, bar the last 20meters, they just hurt! Funny thing is as soon as you cross the finish line, in a wave of endorphins, you can’t wait for the next one.

At the 5k mark two of the Open guys caught me, my appalling lack of run fitness was starting to show, I had bluffed the first part, running around 3.25/3.30 pace. They were running at a decent rate holding 3.20’s, for 3ks I did my best to hold onto their pace, burying myself. My thoughts of questioning why I did this sport changed to wanting to quit.

I think this picture sums it up all. I’m trying to come up with a better description (and failed), it looks like I’m getting ‘violated’ by something large/sharp from behind.

Nearing the end of the run I hit the wall, going from a semi-respectable pace to something more akin to an IM-shuffle (all I needed was those glowsticks to complete the look).

I crossed the line 6^th overall out of 2573 competitors. Frankly it was the best I could have done against that field, I was three minutes off the win and a little over two of the podium. Even though I knew I was seriously underdone I was still pretty devastated (I didn’t qualify for my pro-licence).

In saying that, if you asked me two years ago if I would have believed I was capable of such a result, I would have said "Hell No!" Back then I came 8th in my Age Group and nowhere near the pointy end of the race! 

If there is one picture that summed up this race, and indeed season, this is it. Just after crossing the finishing line

Two weeks later I lined up for the last race of my season, my first sprint-distance, local, draft-legal, non professional licence attempting race in 13 months (thanks calves!)

I had a blast!!! At the local Gatorades you are almost certain to see the most relaxed/social wave being the elites. Even a minute before the start we were all jumping around, being idiots and talking crap. Jamie Huggett decided to pop down to the start-line a full 20s before the race start, good timing!

Fortunately St Kilda didn’t live up to its stereotype and there were no dead body’s or needles blocking my path on the swim. On that note, there weren’t even the usual drunk people hanging around at 5.30. It is always quite entertaining cycling along Fitzroy Street in the early hours of a Sunday morning, seeing the carnage of the night before. Indeed almost every weekend I see the same 6’2 tall black female (I think) prostitute on Fitzroy St next to the pub opposite the tram depot, she wasn’t there on that morning (might explain why there weren’t many party-revellers on the steet, if you know what I mean).

The separation occurred relatively quickly and I settled into the second pack quickly holding feet. The run to t1 was the usual heart-attack inducing affair, but with a good transition I was out in a good position. By the 5k mark our group swelled to seven and we were working relatively well together. We did 20ks in 28mins (42km/h average I think) at 279 watt average with normalised at 283watts (I raced at 68.5kgs, about 2kgs higher than Noosa weight). On the second lap, the cohesion of the group broke down when certain people started taking massive turns leaving everyone else wrecked, ultimately leading to us going from 20s to 40s behind the front bunch. Overall I felt shocking on the bike, legs (and the private parts) were not enjoying the experience! I contented myself with getting shitty with people for not taking turns, all the while trying to avoid them myself J Poor Jack Stek copped a good deal of finger pointing.

Having not run fast in ages, indeed I have had one session on the track in a year and can count on one hand how many times I’ve done sessions with speed/intensity over the same period, it was a rude shock coming out of T2.

The pace was frankly ridiculous, well below my open 5k pb pace (maybe slight exaggeration). Having a poor T2 I was 5s behind the leaders, I buried myself to run up to Kristian and fellow ET (and a massive gun!) Kurt, who at 15 and in his first sprint race was putting on a masterclass. From 800m to the half way mark we ran together. When Kurt put in a dig, I told him off saying “lets work together,” he rightly told me where to go! (no respect for elders, haha). Once we hit the turnaround we had a big gap on the rest of the people in our group and had passed one of the athletes from the bunch ahead. Unfortunately we all hit the wall from there on, the pace slowed dramatically. Yet, we did not all hit the wall at the same time. Our eventual gaps were all solidified between 2.5 and 3ks; they remained pretty constant from there on.

Highlighting how much we slowed down (I was dawdling along at something which couldn’t have been faster than 3.40s) I only just managed to hold off three people from our bunch I had 25s on at the half way mark. That sprint over the last 200m was not much fun.

I crossed the line absolutely spent, but with a big smile on my face! I think people can get lost in the outcomes and forget the process. 

Ultimately we do the sport because it is FUN! Sometimes I feel ‘fun’ is treated as a dirty word, that we should almost feel guilty for having fun, moreover it is assumed that fun and hard work cannot coexist, that’s not the case!

I was happy for Kurt, he had a blinder of a race, if I am going to get beaten by a 15yo, it might as well be someone as humble and like able as him, he’s going places!

I ended up 8^th overall out of 2000+ competitors.

With the season over, brings the usual distress that comes with having so much free-time, trying (and failing) to adjust to the fact you are no longer burning 4,000 calories a day, I swear I get full simply by looking at food now, but being the true competitor I am, I don’t let feelings of sickness stop me eat…that’s true dedication. As I tell myself it’s not eating like a pig, it’s a ‘swimmers diet,’ gotta be buoyant.

A relative of my mate at his 21st, his singlet (and gloves) necessitated a picture with him :)

With that I have a month home in Melbourne now. I am looking forward to a break, catching up with friends, slowly getting back into training (slowly being the operative word) and spending some quality time with the family. They have put up with a lot, let's be honest most triathletes aren't great value when they are training. I am so indebted to my family for not only their incredible support, but their 'tolerance' of me when I am in a sub-optimal training-induced mood. 

With that in mind a couple of things I’ve learned, re early offseason and I’ll try to adhere to:

·

1.     You don't win races in April!
2.     Don’t go to hard in the first few weeks, it’s a recipe to get burned out later on in the year, when you should be training hard/racing.
3. ·   Eat healthy, but don’t bother with worrying if you are a few kilo’s over race weight.
4. ·   Surround yourself with supportive people.
5.     Communication, both ways, is key
6. ·   Don’t make things unnecessary hard, i.e. choosing swim squads which have an hour         round-trip in the morning.
7. ·   Be time efficient
8.     Keep questioning
9.     Finding good physios/doctors/myo's is key, and know when to see them
10.     You can never say 'thank you' enough. I am so unbelievably fortunate to have such supportive friends and family!

Examples to the contrary last season

• Swimming 25ks in my first week back and wondering why I have sore shoulders.
• Getting home at 3am from a nightout, but because I couldn’t afford (well I thought) to miss a long ride in early June (i.e. June 2^nd) I was on the bike and rode 3hrs leaving at 6am (probably still drunk).
• Overtraining and mainly not listening to my body (which lead to my injuries)
• Averaging at least 90mins a day in the car (I went 7 weeks on one tank of petrol at the Gold Coast this year)

Other random musings

• You know you’re a Melburnian when you feel guilty about how good the weather is at the Gold Coast.
• Never do Genocide exam revision just before bed, reading about the slaughter of 800,000 people (mainly by machetes) is not a good 'bed time story.' When the lecturer warns a video clip might be a bit 'graphic' he means watching someone get macheted to death, i.e. very graphic. Again not good for sleep patterns.
• Next time I book a hotel in Sydney check the location more closely, in search of a cheap room I ended up in Kings Cross 50m away from the ‘pleasure den.’ This is bad at the best of times, but stumbling home from a 21^st with the theme being ‘Tux up top, party below,’ is a great way to attract attention from ‘undesirables’
• It’s getting down to 20 degrees in the morning, I can completely understand why people are wearing beanies and complaining about the cold…..NOT! Queenslanders J
• You know you are a uni student when you use Vodka bottles to prop up your books on shelf.
• You know you’re a triathlete when that Vodka bottle hasn’t been opened.

On that note,

Till next time.

P.s. 2263 words