Florida > LA > Vegas > Utah in 3 days

After making the long flight back to LA post St Anthony’s 5150 I was able to meet up with my good friend Wayne Jones and get in some good training from his home in LA. I’m still trying to find my way around and work out some good training locations but Wayne with all his contacts managed to somehow get me into a very exclusive gated community which also happened to have an amazing training pool for me to use while in LA.

LA Training Pool

 Post swim session checking out the view

With just a quick turn around we made the drive on Wednesday out of LA, through Vegas and into St George for the weekends 70.3 US Pro Championships. My home stay in St George was truly amazing and I have to give a huge thank you to Dave, Kim and their son Talon for making me feel at home.

Also thank you again to Dave for helping me get the Specialized S-Works Shiv immaculate for race day. The man spends 5 hours minimum detailing his Corvette and just like me is a perfectionist. 

With St George being a heavily religious area the race was held on a Saturday as apparently if it were to be held on Sunday then 90% of the volunteers would refuse to attend.

The day before I headed out for a swim, ride and run over the course and put together a small video of the ride I did.

Race day is Saturday and to say I am excited against racing the worlds best 70.3 athletes is an understatement.

St Anthony’s, 5150 Florida – 13th

Seeing the names on the start list in the weeks before I knew that was this was going to be one of the races of the season with 45 of the best male triathletes assembled. St Anthony’s would mark my first time racing in the USA and I was keen to show my cards and get a good result on the board. 

I flew into Tampa, Florida on early Tuesday morning and for the week leading up to the race spilt my time between recovering from some crazy jet lag and doing some light training with not too much intensity. St Pete, where the race is held really is an amazing part of the world and I am already keen to come back next year and spend even more time here. Speaking of which, I must give a big thank you to Tim, who I had the pleasure of staying with for the duration of my visit. 

Race Day:

Race day started early (and dark) with the start time set for 6:50am. The swim conditions were extremely rough and the choppy seas made for a challenging but fun swim. The great thing about having a swim like this is that it really broke up the field heading into T2. I emerged from the swim in 15th place and right next to all the major threats. 

Being that this was my first time racing a 5150 event in the USA I was keen to see just how the stagger/drafting rules played out as the USA ruling is quite unique and very different to anywhere else in the world. I held my spot on the bike in the lead group trying to conserve my energy for what would be a very quick run! The cycle leg didn’t feel overly fast but a 43.5kph average speed for the 40km's showed that the pace was in fact quite respectable. 

I hit T2 feeling good and the legs ready to go for the final 10km foot race to the finish. I passed a few other athletes during the course of the first 5km’s of the run and at the turnaround was sitting in the top 10. In the final 3kms I was passed by a few of the quicker runners who rode within the 2nd chase pack. The final km couldn’t come quick enough and I was happy to cross the line coming home in 13th place with a 33.30 final run spilt. 

Ultimately I would have loved to have been further and inside the top 10 but with some of the best of the best in the sport present I can’t be disappointed. I have no doubt that I will be back for more in the years to come as the race is impeccably organized and run with the upmost professionalism.

Results (top 25)

With this result I now move into 6th on the '5150 Pro Mens World Points Ranking'.

Next up for me will be St George US 70.3 Pro Champs next weekend and with another stacked field its going to be another cracker of a race. 

Settling into the USA

After flying back into Brisbane Sunday evening it was a quick unpack and repack before my Monday morning flight from Brisbane to LA. I snagged an emergency exit row on the flight from Brisbane to LAX which allowed me to stretch out the legs over the 14 hour flight. It was a strange flight as I left at Brisbane 11am Monday morning and arrived in LA at 7am Monday morning. I had my good friend Wayne pick me up from LA and show me some of LA and also grab a bite to eat and a few hours of much needed sleep before boarding my final flight from LA to Tampa for this weekends St Anthony's Triathlon.

Driving in LA with Wayne

Feeling quite jet lagged I unpacked, built up my Specialized Shiv and headed to the local pool for a swim then out onto the bike course to see what Sundays race has in store for me. The course looks amazing and the ride and run should be quite fast as it's all dead flat and on smooth roads.

Having never been to the USA before it has been a great experience this week settling into the local swing of things. Food is especially cheap and it's even cheaper to 'eat out' (as the Americans say) from for lunch and dinner than cook at home. I've managed to eat dinner for the grand total of US $7 and lunches are usually about the same.

Grabbing lunch at a local cafe post swim

I am really enjoying the lifestyle in the US and catching up with the other pro athletes at the pool every day for swim sessions. This weekends race, St Anthony's 5150 has about 90 pros on the start list so it should be fast and hard race.

Local pool

 Fellow Specialized athlete Barbara Riveros and I swapping our XS and XL S-Works Shiv bikes

Julia Creek Dirt N Dust Triathlon - 1st

I’ve been racing at Julia Creek for 5 years now. I really feel like this event is something very different to what most expect from a triathlon in Australia. This is where I first raced again triathlon royalty Brad Bevan (aka The Croc) and was well and truly taken to school out on the course fishing 2^nd to the man when I was just 17 years old. This year I was back and keen for win number 3 at the Julia Creek Dirt N Dust Triathlon.

I left Brisbane on Thursday with coach Steve Moss and fellow training partner Emma Jackson. After flying into Mt Isa we met up the Mt Isa Rats Triathlon squad and presented their juniors with their club shirts before heading out to the lake to hold a tri clinic with their adult squad. It was great to do a do a swim and run session with the club and hear about their own personal goals for the Dirt N Dust event and also for the rest of this season. 

After spending the night in Mt Isa we did a final tri clinic focusing on transitions before heading out to Julia Creek for the event the next day.

Due to a lack of rain the creek that the race is held in was really quite low. There was a lot of talk in the weeks leading up to the race if there would even be a swim. I was the test subject as after chatting with the TQ officials the swim leg was finally given the go ahead.

Race Day:

The race started early on Saturday morning with Emma and myself racking our bikes and heading to the swim start area by the 9:30am start time. I managed to get a great start and despite grabbing onto a few catfish while swimming emerged ready to start the cycle leg. The wind had really picked up and for the first 10 minutes or so I really struggled to average more than 34kph. The dry heat and the wind made for well and truly the toughest conditions I have ever faced at the event. It was a matter of putting you head down and having the ability to really hurt yourself in order to maintain your speed. Last year my average speed on the bike was 43kph even with a head/cross wind however this year I only managed 37.6kph. The evidence of how hard I rode was reflected in the read out of my Specialized Quark Power-meter, which showed an average of 400watts for the 25km ride.

Despite the riding hard I was keen to get off the bike and hit the run hard. The run consists of 3 laps up and down the main street of Julia Creek for a total of 5kms. Despite being protected by the buildings in town the head wind was still present and with the hot conditions it made for a tough run. 

I really pushed hard and finished off a tough day coming across the line 1^st to take my 3^rd consecutive Julia Creek Dirt N Dust Triathlon title. Even after riding so hard I managed a 16:31 for the final 5km run which is a great sign that I am getting stronger running off a hard bike ride.

It was also great to see Emma Jackson win her 2^nd title in a row at the event and have the support of my coach Stephen Moss as well.

It’s a quick turnaround now as I’m now heading to St Anthony’s in Florida, USA for this coming weekends race. With 90 Professionals racing the racing is going to be hard and fast. 

2013 Specialized S-Works Shiv

After riding on the original triathlon specific S-Works Shiv aka 'The Red Rocket' (as seen here) for the last year I was extremely excited to get onboard the 2013 S-Works Shiv. If there was ever a bike that was built with the sole purpose of going fast and keeping you fuelled (not to mention looking good) this is it. The concept of building a triathlon specific bike and ignoring all UCI rules is something that should be seen as a major benefit to any triathlete. Put simply the Shiv in my mind is the fastest bike in production.

My setup for 2013 sees a few small extra details which will hopefully help me go just that little bit faster. On board I have the new Specialized S-Works Quarq linked to the Specialized Comp cycle computer which will be feeding me all the numbers for training and racing. For race day I will be running my traditional Zipp disc and 808 combination.

In conjunction with my new ride I had a few people ask via my Facebook and Twitter if I had canned my trademark red race kit now that I'm riding on a black bike. I've mixed it up this season with help from Scody Australia and created a new tweaked version of my 2012 race kit. Thanks again to the team at Scody for making this all happen.

Big thank you as always to Specialized Australia for their continued support.

Mooloolaba ITU World Cup - DNF

Mooloolaba is quite possibly one of the hardest ITU World Cup courses there is. The course is brutal with the bike and run scaling the infamous Mooloolaba hill a total of 24 times. Add the hot and often windy conditions into the equation and you've got yourself a real race of attrition. I did my first ever ITU World Cup at Mooloolaba back in 2009 and this would be my 4th time doing the race.

I really hadn't planned to race the ITU World Cup but was given the opportunity the week out from the race by Triathlon Australia. I really felt that the course suited me and being that there was a smaller than usual field assembled I thought it could be a good opportunity for me to race hard off the front.

On the Friday night before the race I somehow managed to pick up a throat infection and come race day I was feeling less than great. I tried to put these thoughts out of my head and get on with the job at hand and just give the race everything I had.

The swim was moved from the traditional beach start to the river due to dangerous surf conditions. It was a real shame as I really enjoy the Mooloolaba beach swim as it seems to suit a stronger swimmer such as myself. The gun went off at 3pm sharp and within the first hundred metres I moved to the front of the main swim pack. Honestly the pace felt very slow and so I moved up into 3rd with just two other athletes sitting 20 meters or so in front. I managed to have a peak under my arm and see Gomez sitting comfortably on my hip with a large group behind us. It was very different to the ITU World Cup swims I remember and to be honest it felt a lot slower than any 70.3 swim I've ever done.

As soon as we hit the ride I put the hammer down and tried to get away with no success. It seemed like the chasers would shut down any move that went away only to slow right back down when they caught back up. About half way into the race my body was having none of it and I dropped off the group with around a lap left to ride. I couldn't drink or eat on the bike because of my throat infection and was even struggling to breathe in the final few laps.

I headed out of transition onto the run wanting to run hard but with less than a lap done I was forced out of the race. Although I really wanted to push through and finish it just wasn't worth it being how sick I was. It was such a hard call to make but it had to be done to avoid any more damage to the body.

I'll have a few days off now to get the body right and then continue my training for my next block of races in the USA. It's a trip I've really been looking forward and it will be my first time racing in the USA.

2013 Specialized S-Works Venge

What you see before you is the 2013 Specialized S-Works Venge which Specialized Australia has generously provided my for my racing and training this season. Planet Cycles in Brisbane did an amazing job of building up this weapon of a bike just in time for its maiden race at Mooloolaba this weekend. I'm hopeful that I can do this bike justice this Saturday racing in the Mooloolaba ITU World Cup event.

I've only had a few rides on the venge but my first impressions is that this thing is fast.. like crazy fast. The response is instant with every pedal stroke being purely used for pushing you forward. The new Roval Rapide wheel set is truly amazing and they match the matt black paint job on the venge perfectly.

Pictures speak louder than words so below are a few for your viewing pleasure...