Devonport Oceania Championships



My fourth year back to Devonport, another year of dusting off some cobbwebs for the first race of the 2014 season. Training has been going relatively well, starting to add intensity to our base training. What a shock to the system that is! The week leading into Devonport, I had no idea what to expect with a mixed lead up. I know my strengths and I know my weaknesses and they were something I was going to have to play with on the weekend.
 
Race morning, the water was pretty much pancake flat and slightly under 20 degrees. Lining up the race nerves come back and you start to question, do I really know how to do this? With only a small field it was vital to get a good start and work with some of the stronger swimmers. With a smaller field there arent as many links in the chain, so I knew it was important to keep near the front. The choppy water made it hard out near the back buoys but I knew going harder now would benefit me later. After what felt like a pretty solid 1500m swim, I exited the water with 2 other girls and jumped on our bike 40 seconds ahead of the next bunch of girls.




 
I told myself to push hard from the start as I wanted to maintain a gap between us and them. Not being as confident in my run as I would have liked I knew this would be my only chance to get a win or a podium finish. One other NZ girls came with me and we both worked together well.  A little pinchy hill  that we did 6 times was added into the course this year which I personally like as it adds another element into the race and broke the field up alittle more. After 2 laps another girl joined us for the rest of the ride and we pushed the pace all the way till the end. This definitley helped out and gave me alittle more rest from having my nose in  the wind.
 
 




Coming off the bike with just over 2 mins, I had no clue how the race was going to pan out. Having not run much this week, it felt like I had no idea how to run, let alone run fast. Just adding some intensity into our running, I still don’t feel race fit and run to what the best was on the day. This is something that I am looking out to improve throughout the year and be more consistant. I ended up 2nd overall and I can see many positives to the start of the season.
 


Thanks Triathlon Australia for supporting me this weekend and getting more to and from the race. Thanks Devonport Triathlon for another organised and well run event! Thanks Keith Hedgeland and the Examiner Devonport for the photos. To end the weekend we ran into the man himself, John Howard. Have to work on our new support for some  Wollongong Wizard hand action!
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BfnVqujCMAA4F5q.jpg:large

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

WTS Season!

Image
          ITU season overall Driving home from our caving experience in December 2017 with my previous psychologist Jason Patchell, we spoke about what I wanted to achieve this year and how I was going to do it. One of the main things he asked me was what I wanted to set as an overall series goal for the WTS series. After placing 21 st last year, I said a top 15 would be a good progression forward. He looked at me said " what about a top 10? " I tossed it back and forward in my mind wandering if It was a possibility. We finished that conversation with why not make it a challenge and how I was going to get there with other key processes throughout the season. One of my key themes for the year was having confidence in the whole picture. Starting my WTS season with a podium in Abu Dhabi really set the tone for the year and was a big driving force for my confidence and my ability to compete against the best girls in the world. That race was...
Read more

Two weekends. Two races. Two second places

Image
October is a month I really look forward to with two consecutive weekends of hard racing at home in Australia! I was feeling good leading up to Nepean and Noosa. I had a month of consistent sessions and I could see improvement every week especially in my running speed. This time of year I can train when I want and you certainly appreciate the skill involved in coaching when you are under your own guidance. I put old fashioned pen to paper to detail my training weeks and then set about ticking off each session. The morning of the Nepean was absolutely freezing. I had gloves, tights and headwear on just to keep warm and I was still shaking. It was a wetsuit swim for the first time in the 6 years that I have competed and I was glad of the added protection. The women’s field was pretty small and I lead out with five of us exiting the water together. I was a little disappointed with the swim based on how well I have been swimming but the cold was definitely a factor. In the fi...
Read more

WTS Abu Dhabi 2018 - my first WTS podium

Image
With Abu Dhabi on the horizon, I had 4 weeks of consistent training in our Woll ongong base with the knowledge of the demands that the race in Abu Dhabi would have. Building on training and confidence each week was a great starting base for the season. Doing some new sessions in our training environment in this year has lit a new spark giving me confidence back in areas that I had lost. On 16 th February I raced in Devonport Oceania Champs where I placed second after a full week of training. It was great to put processes in place under fatigue and get a full race under my belt. Race day threw everyone off guard with rain starting to fall and a colder air temperature. Abu Dhabi gets about three days of rain a year and racing on the F1 track was going to make critical moments even trickier. Before I even got to the race site, I was covered in sand, water and muck off the roads. I knew that having a good pre-race plan...
Read more