So back at Wellington airport where I last wrote my blog. What a disappointing trip to NZ. Okay- so I did have a lovely time with my wonderful homestay family- Anna, Jon & Harrison Winn. They kindly opened their home to me during my stay in Taupo- ferried me around to multiple race briefings/ meetings/ bag drops/ bike drops/ bike pick ups/ to the swimming pool and kept me entertained with their son Harrison (4) who has more than enough energy to do an ironman himself.
I arrived late Wednesday night and went to bed. Got up Thursday and did a couple small training sessions and attended race briefing. This is when we first learned of the so-called ‘weather bomb’ scheduled to hit Taupo on Friday night and continue into Saturday which was supposed to be race day. They were predicting wind gusts up to 120km/ hr which had potential to stir up lake Taupo and in turn cancel the swim portion of the race. Atmosphere was tight and we were called back on the Friday afternoon for a weather report and what the decision would be in regards to the Ironman on Saturday: which was the Ironman was to be cancelled and in its place a 70.3 would be raced on the Sunday. Same prize money & same Kona points would be on offer for the pros. This meaning I would now be eligible for Kona as NZ 70.3 would classify as an ironman! I didn’t know what I should be feeling about the fact that the race I’d been training for the past 9-10weeks was now not going ahead, and as I’d race 2 long course triathlons in the last 4weeks I lost all pre-race nerves and anxiety about Sunday’s event. I shouldn’t have……
Sunday saw a large improvement in the weather conditions but the cold remained. Lake Taupo was still quite choppy and had dropped in temperature down to 15 degrees. I was still quite prepared for a chilly bike ride having packed a vest, arm warmers and kindly been loaned gloves from a friend. Race start was a late 7:45am which meant I could sleep a little longer and set up in daylight as well as get a longish run warm up pre race. I am not a fan of pro men and women starting together which was the case on Sunday but wasn’t going to be for the ironman. I think that the strong female swimmers love it but when it’s still a work in progress for me I usually suffer with it. Cannon went off and I quickly lost touch with the first and second packs and was swimming in no-man’s land with a pro male tapping my feet for the entire 1.9km- it took me over 30mins (when the last two races with 2km swims have taken me under!) and I came out in 6th place. Rushing T1 to try and get dry clothes onto wet limbs, I left the gloves behind and set out on my bike. The wind was still present but not in the slightest of ways it was the day before. I was about 2mins down on Kate Bevalaquia but the others were out of sight and I had a pro female about 1min down on me. All was going ok during the ride, there were some large male age group packs out on course but seeing the TO’s were giving 3min penalties on the spot meant that the few that were out there, remained stationary for 3mins every time a penalty was given meaning the drafting was pretty rampant. Eventually the two girls behind me were dragged up and at 60/65km I kinda hit the wall and the wheels on my race began to fall off. Trailing by a minute or so into T2 things just went from bad to worse during the run leg. The legs wouldn’t turn over; I lost more and more time and had one of the most disappointing run splits I’ve had in a long, long time. Energy/ nutrition weren’t a root of the cause and I can’t explain why this happened. Potentially too much of a taper and not doing enough in the lead up, potentially all the training over the past couple of months and two races compounding to complete fatigue. Either way, hard- arse here preserved as always making sure the finish line was crossed, in a very unfashionable way. We won’t go into times, I was 8th pro female, but we won’t talk about overall placing either. All I can say is thank-god it wasn’t an ironman!!!!
Thankfully good mates of mine from Lennox were also in town: Luke and Lisa- Luke being my training buddy who did his should one week out from the race and Lisa who started the race was kicked in the face in the swim and ended up pulling out with a black eye! So in essence it could have been much worse. We went out for multiple drinks Sunday night to wallow in our self-pity- not really, lots of laughs and I went to bed feeling much better thanks to them.
So to set another goal, realign my focus and move forward I will definitely be heading to Singapore next week to compete in the 70.3. I’m excited to get back there and see my 2nd family the Smiths and race somewhere hot and humid which I know suits me far better. After that a little bit of down time from the racing side of things to train my butt of for a couple of months before planning a longer overseas trip.
Rachie xo
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