California 70.3
I returned to Oceanside California for my first race of the season hoping to improve on my 9th place finish last year. A very STELLER field was lined up with some of the best Triathletes in the world due to race. Having been injured with tendonitis for most of the winter, I was very much in the dark as to my current form, but with my new Cervelo P2C from Sigma Sport and all my new kit from Orca, I new there was no reason not to give it my all and just see how the “chips fell”.
A relaxed pre-race week has gone without a hitch and everything race morning went fine; so at 6:30am on the Saturday morning I entered the chilly waters to the harbour to prepare for the swim start with the other 50+ male Pro athletes.
I went hard from the start, determined to stick in the pack for the swim with a target of 26minutes after my improved swim times in the pool. Things went well for about the first 700m but then I began to loose touch with the 2nd pack, before I suddenly found myself in no mans land without and one in front in sight. I ploughed on trying to keep the effort level as high as possible, but aware that I had obviously lost touch with most of the swimmers, though I was sure I hadn’t gone off course. I could feel I wasn’t swimming as well as I’d hoped, but was both surprised and disappointed to see 28mins on the clock as I left the water. It was a massive setback to my race plan to be so far behind the main pack.
Onto my bike, I quickly fell into a good pace though and put the disappointment of the swim behind me. My legs felt great and the new P3C had me motoring along and into the Army base for the 90k bike leg. Due to virtually complete lack of time in the saddle over the winter, I’d revised my race plan for the bike and reduced my wattage target by 15watts and knew I was looking at a slightly slower time than I’d like if I stuck to the plan. But my legs felt fantastic and I was quickly catching up many of the men who had come out of the water in front of me.
By the hour mark, I had nearly covered 45k despite the hilly course and was delighted to see the improvement my new bike was making. Up until this point I had been working well and legally with 2 other athletes, but they suddenly decided to ease off the pace leaving me with the tough decision of doing all the work myself and pulling them along, or sitting back and conserving my energy for the run. I went for the latter and we came in off the bike into T2 after a FAR slower (but in fairness MUCH hillier and windier) 2nd half of the bike a little over 2h20mins after I’d left. Once again I knew I’d have lost time to the guys in front and could see about 20 bikes already in transition.
I’d kept tightly to my nutrition plan using the High5 SuperCarbs drink and Gels throughout the bike leg, and was pleased to feel quite fresh as I put my trainers on and set off for the 13.1 mile run. I could see a couple of athletes up to road and set about trying to reel them in. turning at the halfway point of the first of 2 laps on the run, I was on pace for a 1h16 run but wasn’t making enough inroads into the guys in the top ten and cold see that they were already too far ahead to catch. At this point my recently painful blisters returned to haunt me and over the next 4 miles the pain increased more and more (might not sound like much be check out this picture) .
I managed to claw myself into about 15th position but had resigned myself to missing out on making the money slots (8th) and as the pain increased more and more I decided I would call it a day. I was in danger of doing long term damage to my feet and jeopardising my training for the next few weeks and decided that with no benefit to finishing it was the best, most professional decision to take.
I won’t lie, the relief to my feet of giving up was fantastic but the disappointment of having such a poor race was very hard to take. Walking back to the finish line just in time to see the winner Andy Potts sprint to victory made this feel all the more worse.
Now however, injury free and without the blisters to heel on my feet I’m able to take stock and recharge ready for the next race at the end of May and put right all the things that had gone wrong over in California.
A HUGE thanks to my sponsors Sigma Sport, Orca, High5 and Upgrade Bikes (Oval) for all their support as well as to my family for their help with everything.
Thanks to my 2 sponsors Sigma Sport and Orca for their continued fantastic support of me for this race.