TRINSW Sprint Series Race 1

Back up to Kurnell, NSW last weekend for one of my favourite races of the season, mainly because it is close to home but it is at a great location and is always a well run event. Race 1 was also a qualifying race for Sprint Distance World Championships in 2015 so I was expecting some tough competition turn up.  I have been flat out racing the past few weeks and this would be my last one for a while so was keen to make the most of it and have a good hit out.

It is always an early start out there, 4am wake up to ensure I arrive round 0530am for rego and to get a sufficient warm up done for a 7am race start. The course was a 750m bay swim (beach start), 20k cycle quite hilly at the start but flattens out for the last 15k and a 5k cross country run, U30 males were 4th wave off around 0715am. Bike racked and it was time for warm up, short run and was in the water well before race start for a good pre race swim. I had been in there for around 15min and it was right on race time and course was still not set out, standing on the beach waiting and waiting,

I hopped in for another swim. Race start ended up being delayed by over 30min but finally we were off and racing. Gotta love beach starts, running on water a body length ahead of the rest of the field

Pictured furthest away from camera

I lead the U30 swim for start to finish and had a decent gap on the rest of the competition, coming into T1 the run up the bank was congested and decided to take to the grass and found myself falling in a ditch, luckily I didn't twist anything and was back up running into T1. The bike mount is a bit tricky as it's on a hill and as I watch people falling up ahead I ran my bike 100m or so up to the flat to mount. Feet in shoes straight away as there was another punchy hill just ahead, these little hills continued for the fist 5k before I was out of the National Park and on the main road.

I had kept my lead until about 8k in the bike when Douglas came past me at what looked to be like car speed and he was gone in the next minute. Although I felt pretty flat on the bike I still managed to post 2nd fastest time overall. Onto the run now still placed 2nd and about 50sec down on Douglas I heard, although my form felt alright I knew I was running slow and this went on for the first 3.5k. It wasn't until the last lap I felt like I was at my speed but by then the race was over and settled for 2nd overall.

Another good race at Kurnell, happy to come away with second behind strong competition. That finishes up racing for a while until the New Year, time to get some solid back to back weeks of training done and maybe the odd ocean swim.