Auckland was not the result I was after, nor was it the race
I know I am capable of producing. I finished 11th, which was a
little way off my somewhat lofty goal of a top 5 finish. When you look at the
calibre of athletes who competed, and the fact that the top 19 athletes went
sub 4 hours, you get an appreciation of the level of competition. If you’re not
100% on your game, you’re just going to get exposed out there and I didn’t have
the legs on the day to go with the big hitters.
Auckland turned on the goods for race day with a serving of
mild temperatures with no wind. I’ve been lucky enough to start working with
Blue Seventy wetsuits for 2014 and it’s honestly the best suit I’ve swum in. I found the swim quite hard after getting
worked around the first buoy but settled in and emerged at the head of the
chase pack with all the main big dogs, but a couple of the super fish had
wormed away from us in the last few hundred meters.
The bike course in Auckland is great, offering spectacular
views of the sunrise over the harbour as you head over the Auckland Harbour
Bridge. We formed a lead pack of about 10 guys but there wasn’t too much
excitement over the 90km. I was actually fairly comfortable on the bike which
is a huge positive for me as I know my bike is coming along on leaps and bounds
due to a far more specific approach to my training.
I got an adrenaline rush off the bike and ran out a little
harder than I had initially anticipated. I was stride for stride with Kempy,
Docherty and Terenzo. We took it out at low 3min km’s and for the first 3km and
I was hoping the pace would settle but unfortunately it didn’t. From 3km to
10km I hit a long bad patch and was passed by numerous athletes from the chase
pack but I muscled up and held my position for the second lap coming home in 11th.
I knew coming into this race that I was stretching my good form
over a couple of months and I knew it was always going to be difficult to maintain my level of performance that I had in my peak during November the start of
December. It’s a delicate act trying to balance form, training and ensuring you’re
getting the appropriate recovery and in this case my form had started its
downward spiral. It’s easy to over analyse a performance that is less than your
best, but the reality is that you only need to be 2% off your top form to be
exposed in a field like this. For me it was the first time I have competed in a field of
this quality in a 70.3 and it’s never easy to know how to play to your
strengths when you’re lining up against some of the best guys in the world.
Thanks for reading.
