MAGOG CAMTRI RECAP

Everything has been going well since Belle River. I recovered very quickly from the sprint distance race and went straight into a good block of training before the Magog CAMTRI Triathlon.

My swimming was only feeling okay for the past few weeks but my riding was feeling the best it ever has and my run has been coming along nicely. Andrew Beardsall and I traveled to Magog with his parents on Wednesday to keep the traveling as smooth as possible. I started feeling amazing in the water once we got to Magog. One of the best prep sets in the pool I ever have done was on the Thursday leading into the race! My biking was also feeling really good; I even managed to crack my highest wattage ever while pre-riding the bike course. I even had one of my best tempos running on the Tuesday leading into the race.

Race morning was very relaxed for me. I felt more prepared than I ever have going into a race. I really nailed the taper for the first time in a while. It was a really good confidence booster and made the nerves almost none existent the morning of the race. I got up super early as I always do so that I could be alert and ready to race. My warmup went really well, and I actually had enough time to get a solid swim warmup in which is always a huge bonus.

PHOTO CREDITS: Maddy McMillan 

The swim was okay for me. I had a pretty bad start, and I really don’t think I could have come out of the water where I did if the race had been another sprint. I didn’t make up much time until the last quarter of the swim.

PHOTO CREDITS: Maddy McMillan 

As I came out of the water I could see that I was right with the leaders. I sprinted through transition, put my helmet on and got ready to hammer the bike. Fortunately I was in lead pack before I knew it! It was a pretty relaxed bike once our pack was established. I spent a lot of time up front because of last year’s fall on the same course but I’m very pleased with how my legs felt going into T2 even after working so much on the bike!

PHOTO CREDITS: Maddy McMillan 

My T2 was really the only bad part of my race. I ended up going down the wrong row and then my bike fell over, not once but twice. Knowing it wasn’t going to stand up no matter what I did, I decided to leave it hoping that the officials saw the effort I put in. I didn’t end up getting a penalty so I’m happy I decided that after a second try it was no longer worth it. Because I lost so much time going into transition I hammered out onto the run course. I had to calm myself down and settle into a good pace hoping that some of the people in front would come back to me. I tried to hold my form together and hung tough for a 21^st finish in a very competitive field in only my second Olympic Distance race! I can’t confirm this but I believe I was 13^th overall in the Elite Men’s Nationals with this result and 10^th in the under 23 nationals.

PHOTO CREDITS: Maddy McMillan 

I’m very happy with this result and I really look forward to racing even more Olympic Distance races. This weekend I’ll be racing the Ontario Draft Legal Provincials as a New Brunswicker. It should be another good race and I really look forward to it.

Thanks to Andrew Beardsall and his parents for their hospitality and for putting up with me all week. I’d also like to thank my parents for coming out to watch me race for the first time in 2 years! Racing at this level would not be possible without their support and the support of Nineteen Wetsuits, Triathlon New Brunswick, Human Performance Centre, C3 and Aberdeen Subaru.

Belle River Recap

It's definitely been a few weeks since my last blog post, however my training has been going a lot better than my blogging! Since Dallas I have been mostly chipping away at the running side of things. On June 21st I went down to Toronto for the first of three draft legal races in Ontario. They started a new series in 2015 that gives athletes such as myself two more draft races we can do on top of the provincials. Kudos to Triathlon Ontario for starting up this great series!

Toronto's recap will be brief, just like my race was! (you'll get the joke in a second). I had an okay swim in Toronto but that made me miss lead pack. I found it very hard to get back into a good rhythm in the water after Dallas and was just started to feel good again leading into the race. After an okay swim I had an amazing T1 and felt great as soon as I got on the bike. I was a bit too far behind lead pack to chase them down but also a bit ahead of the people I came out of the water with. I decided to 'wait up' for the guys and we formed a pack of 4. After 5k into the race I could see the leaders so I attacked pretty hard, it was successful at first but my legs just couldn't handle closing the gap. I then thought we might be able to catch up to the leaders if I waited for the pack of three to come back. Almost immediately after they caught me I ended up in a pot hole after a pull which caused me to puncture. With no wheel stop and carbon clinchers I was forced to stop. It was unfortunate but I'm glad it happen in this race rather than the bigger ITU races I was in earlier on this season.

After Toronto, slightly frustrated, I got right back into training. Luckily the week after Toronto I had one of my favourite training partners come to visit, my dad. I hadn't seen him since Christmas so it was very exciting to get out for a few rides and to watch him rip up the track over at the university. The day he flew out I went down to London to race a 5000 on the track. I was feeling really good leading into the race and knew I had a PB in me. I ended up kicking for home like a sprinter to a 16:01.56 which was 5 seconds faster than I have ever run. I was very happy but knew there was not a lot of time to celebrate because week three of racing was coming right around the corner!

I felt pretty sore post 5000 because of the spikes. I still hit the run workouts I was planning on that week but I was still a lot sorer than I would have liked. Belle river is close to 3 hours away from Hamilton so David Hopton, a fellow C3 member and friend, decided to drive down the day before. After Lionel Sanders asked around to see if there was a place to stay Andrew Vendrasco and his girlfriend let us stay at their house. I would like to thank them again for that because they made our lives so much easier!! Initially Dave and I thought we were starting at 8:00am which made us get to the race site a bit early because we soon found out that our race start was actually 9:30. This turned out to be a blessing in disguise. It allowed me to get a very solid run warmup in and left me enough time to warmup the way I like to in the water.

The swim was an in water start which I really liked, and no wetsuit which is also very nice. I had an okay start but it took me a little while to get going in the water. We did a 180 degree turn and headed back towards the start. At that point I was feeling pretty good and started going very hard to catch up to the leaders. I believe I came out of the water in 4th just 10 seconds down of Alex Hinton. I knew I was in a good spot and controlled myself as I went through transition.

The bike was pretty uneventful and I tried not to pull like a crazy 16 year old (like I used to pull). It was flat and fast; and as soon as I hopped off the bike I knew I had a fast run in me. Alex lead out of transition and I was in second. Soon after Jackson Laundry and Jacob Jamnicky went by me. I kept it cool but still ran really hard. I ended up catching up to Jacob a little before halfway and stayed in third for the rest of the race.

Here are a couple of pictures from the race this weekend:

Thanks to Nineteen wetsuits, Triathlon New Brunswick, C3, Human Performance Centre and Aberdeen Subaru for the support!