70.3 World Championships 2007
This was the last race of the year and easily the most important. After an early season of indifferent and disappointing form I was keen to build on the national title I’d won in September and finish the year on a real high. I’d prepared as completely as possible and having had 4 weeks since I left work, I knew I was as rested as I could be. My home stay hosts, Tiger and Betsey had been fantastic too and so I felt in great shape the night before.
Race morning came and perfect conditions were forecast for the day, light northerly winds and low 70’s temperatures. Thankfully having spent the previous week using Roehampton Universities Climate camber training at 80 degrees and 60% humidity, I knew that I’d be well prepared for these temperatures. I found myself lined up with the other 50 odd Pro’s at 7:10am looking around at a “who’s who” of triathlon. All the big names were here and it was going to be a brutally fast race. The gun went and we all started the 20m dash down the beach into the warm sea waters. After 4 minutes or so, the fighting and trashing settled down and the pace did the same. I was pleased to feel comfortable after the initial intense start, but soon realised I’d got into the wrong pack on the water. By now 60m up the course were the people o wanted to be swimming with. It was too late to try to break and catch them though so I sat in for what was a fairly comfortable swim. Despite having done only 1 short swim in it leading up to the race, my Orca 3.8 wet suit proved as comfortable as ever and kept me feeling loose and fresh. As I exited the water with about 6 or 7 other guys I looked down at my watch and knew it had been TOO comfortable, with a disappointing split of just over 28 minutes.
Nothing to do about that now though and I was more determined not to crash coming out of T1 this year. Thankfully I managed to stay upright whilst sorting myself out in the first few meters of the bike leg and quickly settle into my pace. Using my SRM’s I stuck to the power limits that my coach (Bridgitte Swales) and I had worked out through the testing we’d done at Roehampton Uni in the weeks before the race. The course in Clearwater is pretty much ALL flat, with great road surfaces making it exceptionally fast on the bike. Riding my Sigma Kronos and some brand new Zipp deep section wheels I was soon flying along almost effortlessly thanks to these great bits of kit. The speed of the course, and my bike and wheels meant that at times I was happily riding along at over 60kph. I set about trying to make up the deficit of the swim and catching the next guy up the road. The miles seamed to fly by and before I knew it I was on the last main section of the course getting ready for the run. I past Spencer Smith at this point as well as most of the women who had started 10minutes before the men. I polished off the last of my High5 Carbo+ gels climbed over the Memorial Causeway, down the other side and started to shake my legs off for the run. I’d ridden exactly to the power plan I wanted and was going to come in on about 2h05, averaging 43.2kph.
Entering transition I knew straight away that my legs felt good. I donned my trainers and hat, grabbed my 3 High5 gels and headed out for the 13.1 mile run with my brother shouting out my overall position of 26th. My legs felt great as I set off past the crowds lining the start of the run course, I took splits of my first 3 miles and was hitting my target of 5:42/mile. Over the other side of the causeway and running through the mansion filled Belleair neighbourhood I caught Leanda Cave (2nd in the womens race at that point) and kept targeting the next male pro in front, gaining 3-4 places before heading home on the first lap. At about mile 5 I started to loose my pace and struggle, but with women’s eventual winner Mirinda Cafree running right with me, I tried to pace off of her to get me through this darker period of the race for me. Unfortunately I couldn’t keep the pace up and slowed for a few miles and had to let her go on without me. By mile 9 my slower pace had let me recover somewhat and I was able to pick it up slightly. Bjorn Anderson (fastest bike split) was less than 200m in front as were another couple of Pro’s and I was determined to catch them. With about 700m to go, I caught them all and surged (well it felt like a surge, but probably looked more like a stumble) to try and make sure they didn’t stay with me to the finish. Thankfully it worked and I crossed the line with a disappointing 1h20 run, a touch over 3h59 overall and as 19th Pro and 3rd Brit home after Andrew Johns (3rd) and Fraser Cartmel (7th).
I’d not improved my placing on last year, but still gone over 8 minutes faster, proof of the tremendously strong field racing.
A huge amount of thanks to all my sponsors Sigma Sport, Orca, High5, and Zipp Wheels. Also to Bridgitte and Roehampton Uni for the acclimatisation training in the weeks leading up to the race. Also to Tiger and Betsy my home stay hosts for being so helpful and welcoming to us during our stay and my brother as my support crew for the race.
Thanks to my sponsors Sigma Sport, Orca and High5 for their continued fantastic support of me for this race.