Samoa Warrior Half Iron Distance Triathlon – 1st (Course Record)

When planning my race calendar at the start of this year I must admit that I had never planned to race this event. A chat another athlete several months ago during my time up in Cairns for Coral Coast 5150 (2nd place) and Ironman 70.3 Cairns (5th place) sparked my interest. 13 days prior to this event I finished 2nd at Ironman 70.3 Philippines in very hot and humid conditions and so I thought that another half iron distance event in the heat and humidity would bode well for my ITU Long Course World Championship preparations.

I had heard what lay in front of me from those who raced the event last year and was looking forward to racing this very challenging course. Tim Berkel and Cam Brown had raced this event last year with Tim suffering 3 flat tires and Cam with 2. After hearing this I made sure that I was very well prepared and chose to ride my Specialized S-Works Shiv with Roval CLX60 wheels front and rear. For racing I almost always use the S-Works Turbo clincher tyres however with rough roads ahead I swapped these for a brand new set of Specialized Roubaix tyres which I hoped would provide just that little extra security of the added puncture protection.

Race Day:
The swim course was held over two by 1km loops on a triangular shaped course. I knew that last year’s winner and course record holder Graham O’Grady would be the man to watch in the swim and sure enough Graham joined me at the front end of the field early on. The water temperature was very warm and so I didn’t swim particularly hard due to the fact that I didn’t want to cook myself too early on in the race. I exited the water right on the feet of Graham and made the call to put on running shoes for the 600 meter run into transition. Over this run I pulled up my Scody A.I.R tri suit which I had tucked into my HUUB swim skin during the swim leg. I have been loving racing in my custom Scody A.I.R sleeved raced suit as I feel like it actually keeps me cooler by keeping the sun off my back, shoulders and arms.

I came into transition in first and hit the bike leg with a small gap over Graham O’Grady and Ollie Whistler. The ride consisted of four by 5km loops in town before heading out onto the very rough roads of Samoa. I felt strong early on during the bike leg and so I pushed the pace and established a small gap within this first 20kms. The rest of the 70kms was out and back over some of the worst roads I have ever ridden. The entire ride was littered with potholes making it very hard to keep a high average speed. I went through the first hour with an average speed of 39.7kph and keep the pace as high as I could. The heat and humidity were now starting to take full effect and I made sure to keep on top of my hydration. I had some good company during the ride in the form of two police motorbikes (one in front and one behind) which came in handy as they helped to flag motorists off the road that I caught which gave me a clear path. The added bonus was that they also helped to stop the many dogs and one large pig from crossing the road in front of me. The last 4kms towards the bike turn around was up a very steep mountain road and with the humid and hot weather it was quite tough and a total sweat fest. I had a chance to recover on the downhill before the final 30kms flat section back into town over the pothole filled roads. I got off the bike with numb hands and sore shoulders due to holding onto my bars so tight during the ride. The entire ride I pushed as hard as I could to build my solo lead and so I finished the bike feeling quite spent.

At the half way point of the first of four by 5km run loops I had my first chance to see what kind of lead I had on second place. Ollie was looking strong holding onto second place with the gap being around four minutes. The run was scoring hot and reminded me a lot of my race at Ironman 70.3 Philippines just 13 days earlier. I made the most of every aid station grabbing ice and cold sponges to cool my core body temperature down. If I have learnt anything about racing in the heat it is that keeping your core temperature down in extreme heat is by far the most important factor in getting to that finish line.

So in saying this my goal on the run leg was simply to stay as cool as I could and hold onto my lead (two of the pro men were forced out of the race on the run leg due to heat exhaustion). Over the four out and back laps I was able to get a good idea of my time gap to second place and managed to keep this at around four to five minutes for the entire run. I was very happy to hit the finish line and take the title of 2014 Samoa Warrior Half Iron Distance Champion in a new race record time. This course was totally brutal and one of the most honest and hardest courses that I have ever raced on and well and truly worthy of the ‘warrior’ title given to this race.

 Results

1. Sam Betten, 4:20:26

2. Ollie Whistler, 4:25:48

3.Stephen Farrell, 4:49:11

4. Jared Bowden, 5:24:58

5. Darren Young, 5:33:28

*Photo Credit MeadNortonPhotography *

Specialized 2015 Product Launch

A few weeks ago Specialized Australia asked me if I was interested in coming along to their 2015 dealer event/product launch held on the Gold Coast. After a massive day of travel back from Ironman 70.3 Philippines (where I placed 2nd) I landed in Brisbane on Wednesday morning at 7am and then drove down to meet up with the Specialized Australia team. The entire event was professional, informative and not to mention massive! Having the chance to checkout the new products for 2015 was an amazing opportunity and there are already a few Specialized bikes, apparel and accessories that I have my eyes firmly fixed on for 2015! For those interested I thought that I'd share some of what I saw at the event and what I am excited about for 2015.

This S-Works Venge is totally stealth and the paint work is even more amazing in person

 New Specialized Venge bikes all lined up

 The new S-Works Tarmac is truly amazing. An incredible amount of r&d went into the new Tarmac.

 The S-Works TT helmet is something that I can't wait to get on my head. Matt black is my pick! 

 Just one of the outdoor setups. A full demo area was also going on. 

New S-Works Amira has one of the coolest paint jobs i've seen.

 Always so good to catchup with the man himself Mark Cote (aero r&d for Specialized). 

A big thank you to Specialized Australia for supporting me for close to 4 years now. It was very cool to be given the opportunity to attend this event and keep your eyes out for when the 2015 range hits your LBS. 

Ironman 70.3 Philippines - 2nd

It’s crazy to think that this is just my second year of 70.3 racing since making the switch from ITU/short course racing. In just this short amount of time I have finished 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th & 6th (one of each) at various Ironman 70.3 events around the world. With this being said I must admit that I am pretty desperate to get on that top step of the podium as soon as possible. Ironman 70.3 Philippines I hoped would be the place to finally get that elusive win I have been chasing. I had spent the last few months since Ironman 70.3 Cairns in a rather large training block and therefor knew that I was in great form leading into this race.

My Specialized S-Works Shiv getting racked and ready for race day

Race day:

After flying into Cebu on the Thursday prior the race I had stayed pretty relaxed and come race morning felt ready to get on that start line and go hard right from the gun. The swim course was without question the most amazing swim leg I have done as it started on the resort beach with a coral reef filled with fish just meters below you. Once the gun went off I started hard and quickly took the lead within the first hundred meters. I have been training with a great swim squad over the last few months, which has really transformed my swimming ability making me a lot more efficient and faster in the water. I enjoyed setting the pace up front and managed to gap most of the field quite early on with just Brent McMahon, Casey Munro and Michael Murphy able to stay with me. I exited the water first feeling very relaxed and picked up a nice swim bonus paycheck for being the first athlete to reach dry land.

Leading out of the water

After the swim to bike transition the four of us hit the open road together with Brent setting the pace up front for the early part of the bike leg. I pulled through and did my share of the work up front with Casey keen to sit back and let Brent and myself do the majority of the work up front. Casey after the race told me that he felt quite sick during the ride, which made sense, as he is usually a very strong rider. With guys like Cameron Brown (10 time IM New Zealand Champion) behind I was eager to keep riding hard to extend our gap to the rest of the field chasing hard behind. After 20km’s Michael Murphy dropped from our group of 4 with, what I found out later was a bike mechanical issue. The back end of the course consisted of a 8 by 6km out and back ‘double M’ course which meant that we had a good mix of head wind and tail wind with each out and back section. I have never taken onboard any extra bottles during a half distance race before but with the extreme heat and humidity I decided to grab 2 ice cold water bottles to pour over my head and drink as much as I could at the 30km and 60km sections of the bike ride. I also took onboard another bottle towards the end of the bike leg, which I poured over my head in an attempt to cool my body down only to discover that this wasn’t in fact water but Gatorade. The entire ride was very windy not to mention scorching hot, which made for quite a tough 90 kilometres.

Getting off the bike I was ready to run hard and was feeling quite good even after such a hot and windy 90km ride. The 2 loop run course had spectators lining both sides of the road and the support and cheering was totally insane. Brent hit the gas as soon as we left transition and I pushed myself hard to try and keep the gap to a minimum however the duel Olympian showed me a clean set of heals and was just too fast.

The heat on the run was totally crazy and I felt like I was melting into the ground on each lap. At the aid stations there were small buckets of ice-cold water that people poured over your head to cool you down. This effect lasted for about 30 seconds before you were scorching hot once again. In addition to this there were also large baseball sized chucks of ice given out on the course, which I shoved down the front of my Scody tri suit. These large chunks of ice lasted roughly 4 km’s before completely melting. After the first lap I got a few words of encouragement yelled at me from Jensen Button (Formula 1 driver) who was just heading out to start his run leg. Hats off to Jensen for taking the time out of his race to give me some words of encouragement.

The run was a real war of survival and was more about just making it to the finish line than running fast. I held 2nd place and crossed the line feel totally cooked from the insanely hot run. The event organization had put small swimming pools just after the finish line (filled with cold water, big slabs of ice and cans of beer floating around in them), which I spent a good amount of time in to try and bring my core body temperature back down post race.

All in all I was very happy with 2nd place. I went into the race wanting the win badly but Brent had the goods on the day to take the win in the Philippines. Unfortunately this means that I am still chasing my first Ironman 70.3 victory, which I hope will come in 2014.

A huge thank you once again to all my sponsors, coach, family, support team and supporters. I honestly wouldn’t be where I am today with out all of your amazing support.