Back to Racing: Hazelwood 100 race report

Last Sunday saw myself take part in my first triathlon in 10 months, the Hazelwood 100. Firstly a big thanks to Noel Fenn and his crew at LaTrobe Vale Tri Club for putting on the weekends racings.  Now onto the race report.

The race started with a solid swim for me. Fairly happy with my time resulting in just over a 7min PB, I’ll take that. With small numbers in the race and my still weak swim ability meant that i ended up swimming the whole way not sitting on feet so was a good test to see where I was really at. First lap was ok, didn't swim the straightest and sighting was fairly poor. This improved on the second lap and started to gain a few positions. A positive sign moving forward.

T1 was rusty to put it nicely. lack of racing defiantly showed there. Onto the bike felt fairly flat in the legs. Just one of those days where it feels like an effort to keep the speed up. First 3.5 laps of the 5 lap bike went well and were very closely paced. After that had a few structural issues show up again in the later half of the bike which was a bit of a disappointed but was much better to find these things out now rather than closer to IMWA. T2 was quick and smooth. The legs never got going on the run mainly due to the issues that popped up on the bike plus due to a bit of training fatigue. Nothing to be to concerned about at this stage.

Overall I was fairly pleased with the race. Got one into the legs and found out a few important issues that now have to be worked through. Big thanks to my coach Xavier Coppock and a few of my training partners for keeping me on track and helping change a few things mentally that I’ve had to get through. Its also been great to see so many of my training partners and T.E.A.M. members racing well over the last few weeks with some pretty big results. No real surprise here that those results have come, the training environment that has been created around the squad is top rate and shares a lot of the same qualities that top programs around the world are reported to have.

Now its back to the training track for me as I start my main training block for Ironman Western Australia. Still plenty of work to be done in the 9 weeks before I reach taper time.