Miyazaki World Cup

Coming off the high of a World Championships atmosphere and back into a "home" environment is always an odd feeling.

For most elite athletes the World Championships weekend is a rare opportunity to let your hair down and go a bit wild for a night (post race of course). If you’re selected it is generally your biggest event for the year. Like-minded people surround you and you’ve all been stringent for months on end. So, naturally, you’re ready to let loose. Though the biggest race isn’t always the last race. With no imaginable doubt, did I not enjoy this occasion.
For most Aussies it’s a couple of months overseas capped off with worlds, so coming back home is most certainly nice, but it’s also extremely difficult if you are getting back into the swing of things for one last race or two. For me, it’s not home, home time either. I had to stay in Melbourne and subsequently away from my family for another month and a half, almost rounding out a whole year of not being there. So I found it a lot harder to keep upbeat about the hard yards to come before the final World Cup on the ITU circuit.
The weeks leading into Miyazaki were off to a good start, unfortunately a few weeks in I had developed a slight plantar fascia issue. So I was unable to run for about a week and couldn’t risk any work at pace in case I over did it and tore something. Our physio advised not to run at all. After consulting with Danielle, our strength and conditioning coach and the physio we decided I could run as long as I was doing isometric exercises 3× a day every day, and the pain wasn’t worsening. Fortunately this did help me keep up a minimal amount of mileage.

Getting into Miyazaki I was feeling relatively confident. I managed myself on the flights quite well and I felt good. The training days leading in left my foot feeling quite sore, I wasn’t able to travel with a Smith machine and 70kg of plates so I relied on gravity and used my own mass, for the first time ever I wished I was heavier. Most mornings and most jogs my foot felt stiff and sore but it was what it were. I was going to get through the run and I knew that.
Marcel and I had spent many hours together leading into this race. We worked really well and got in some great quality work in the pool and on the bike. I was confident in my swim-bike and I knew that I just had to pace it and build through the run to try not aggravate my foot too early on.
Like I have been throughout the year, I swam, ran and rode to the race site the morning of. I’m still modifying the formula but I feel like I’m getting close to what primes my body the best.

I got down to the race site with plenty of time to spare, it’s always interesting riding around trying to figure out the maze of areas we’re granted access to, and of course how we actually get into the athlete lounge.

Eventually we made our way in and I got through all the check in procedures quite quickly. I spent a few minutes sitting down and planning out my next moves.
I grabbed my water bottles and put them in my bag to keep them out of the sun, threw on my joggers and went out for a 10-minute trot to get things moving freely again. Did a few strides to just below race pace and headed back into the athlete lounge.
I didn’t want to go for another swim because it’s not what I had usually done but I decided to jump in the water and did about 100m or so just to roll the arms over.

Once I got back into the lounge it was about time to head over to the athlete introduction area.
Before long everyone was in line and headed down to the water.
This was a strange start, I’m unsure as to why but there was no pontoon. It was a deep-water start.
Everyone had chosen a number on a line and eventually we were ushered into the water.
I was wearing number 15 and somehow managed to sneak into 14th on the line up. The inside line was more direct so the closer to number 1 I could get, the better.

It was a long and chilly wait in the water but before long the music suddenly cut and turned to the infamous heartbeat thudding which resonated through my body. Anxious as ever, the entire crowd silent, the air horn sounds.

Generally I make my way to the nearest to outside as possible. 14 in proved to be a relatively daunting position, it’s always rough as hell for at least the first half of the swim so the clearer of waters I can get - the better it is.

The better it is, is purely out of fear of being absolutely pumped in the water. I’m not sure what made me change my mind but about 100m in I just thought to myself, "fuck it, sit in" and I did my best to use my elbows as make shift bumpers. Fortunately there weren’t too many people drifting left and right and I didn’t get receive too many feet grabs within the first 200m. As the pack began to narrow and line up for the battle of the first buoy I began to be knocked around a bit. I did my best to stand my ground and do mini surges to keep my elbows at other athletes’ eye levels rather than the other way around but I soon lost a fight for a position. I copped an elbow to the eye, stuck my head up and got the returning windmill of an arm straight to the cheekbone. This rattled me a bit and I fell back a body length, in a panicked rush I swam across 2-3 athletes and got to the inside and clear of the mayhem.

Rounding out lap one was far more settled than the initial 300m. It was, however, relatively chaotic nonetheless. I held my position and found myself running out of the water after lap one, at about mid-pack. After I rounded the turning buoy on land I darted to the left and changed sides as I ran back into the water to dive in.
Of course this was a great tactical move for the one buoy we turned left at. The rest of them were right-hand turns so it was an error that did not help me for the rest of lap 2. Fortunately, I swam well and moved up a tiny bit.

Running into transition was not treated with as much haste as I usually would because I knew I was close to the main pack. I did not know there was a small breakaway group of 8, but the run to transition would not have seen me gain 25 odd seconds.

I jumped on the bike and railed myself for the first 5 or so minutes so that the weaker riders could not get an easy tow. Eventually a large pack formed and we weren’t working well at all. It was quite windy so nobody wanted to pull turns into the wind. There were long and solid turns made and short bomb-like attacks happening quite frequently and it was not helping our group gain any time on the break.

I was trying to be conservative all the while throwing in a few turns to keep the pace even and rich but it wasn’t fruitful. Halfway through lap 3 I found myself leading into the U-turn into the headwind. My roll wasn’t far from the U-turn so I hit it pretty hard and accelerated solidly out. A Japanese athlete stayed with me but we opened up a 2-3m gap just from the turn. Initially I didn’t think much of it but shortly after it opened up to about 10m and nobody was doing anything about it. The Japanese athlete came around me to pull a turn and I turned to see what was going on, we had opened a small gap and nobody looked to be doing anything about it. As I rolled back through to take another turn I found myself dropping lower and lower on the cassette and ramping up the pace.

350...380...420...480...550... All of a sudden I was pushing almost 600 watts. No one was on my wheel and I could tell I was closing the 20 seconds or so gap to the front group. It was into a tailwind so I knew that they would be hooking, but I had an opportunity and the way the pack was working; I knew I might regret not taking it.
After a couple of minutes it levelled out to about 500 watts and I was grinding in as low a gear as I could without dropping below 90rpm.
As I was nearing the exit of the highway I knew as soon as I took the left hand bend the crosswind would make me pop something ridiculous. So I dropped another gear and buried myself again.

I came into the left hand bend way to hot and as I exited I came within centimetres of the median strip. It gave me a slight rush of adrenaline and I hopped out of the saddle and sprinted. It was a short 300-400m stretch of road until another left hand bend and subsequent block headwind.

It took some serious grit to close the final 15-20m but I got on just after I hit the head wind.

It took a fair bit out of me so I spent the next half lap trying to recover. I could tell the group was working well so I wanted to start rolling as soon as I could.
I did a turn or two on the 4th lap, was gearing up to begin rolling and tried to take a gel but unfortunately I dropped it. Nonetheless I jumped in and did what I could to keep the group motivated.

We rolled really well for the next lap and a bit but into the headwind we began to fall apart.
Not long after that the main pack must have gotten into a rhythm and they caught up.
As they did a lot of athletes began to roll around our group. I was fairly cooked but I knew I had to stay near the front at least. So I picked it up and went around on the nearest wheel that came past.

The next few laps were pretty up and down. Same thing, nobody wanted to work into the headwind but through the technical sections there were intentional attacks to panic the athletes at the back. However, it would soon bunch up again.

It was quite manic coming down the long tailwind assisted straight for the final time. Everybody wanted a good position and it wasn’t going to change much after we exited the highway.
I did my best to stay near the front but some dodgy moves were made and I found myself about mid pack. I knew I might have a chance on the narrower roads, the crosswind meant people would be putting it in the gutter on the left. So if I attacked up the right I could make a few positions, and so I did.
I still didn’t enter transition very high up which was detrimental but there wasn’t much more I could have done.

Staying composed is something I’ve finally picked up so my T2 was smooth and fast. I headed out onto the run at a quick but build-able pace.

It was tough watching athletes gradually move away from me throughout the first 2km. I knew that I had to let it go if I were to run well. I could feel the strain on my left plantar fascia as I went in any direction other than straight so I had to be carful around the corners and bends. I would lose a bit of time at each bend but it was crucial to take it easier in order to actually finish without doing some damage.
Before long they began to pop and over the next 3km I was beginning to pick up places. I found myself running with and taking turns into the headwind with an athlete from the Czech Republic, we were both running a smart race and made a lot of ground over the 2nd half of the run.

With about 1.5km to go he attacked and it was just after I had taken a turn. It was also into a head wind so he timed it perfectly and put a gap into me that was enough for me to lose contact. I knew I could keep pushing as it was into the headwind so I back off and built toward another Japanese athlete just ahead.

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I sat on him for about 5 seconds and realised I couldn’t do this for long and went around. He jumped on me despite my best efforts and sat there the whole way in the headwind until the final U-turn. I tried peeling off but he wouldn’t come through, I didn’t want to slow down too much to force him to take a turn so I just pushed at the highest sustainable pace as possible.

As we turned and began the final 600-800m stretch to the finish he came around and kept pushing and building until eventually he managed a to open a small gap. With about 200m to go I kicked again and tried going around but he had another gear as well. We were gaining on the Czech Republic athlete too but unfortunately I narrowly missed edging in front of the both of them.

I ended up in a solid 15th to round out a successful year. A lot has been learned and I’ve had some great results and some great educational experiences concerning racing. I’m looking forward to doing it all again next year on an even bigger stage.

Huge thanks to the network of people and companies that allow me to represent them on a world class level.

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