I exited the water in 13th and from the beginning of the bike I was comfortably in the front group. The bike was a leisurely pace which was nice as I managed to save my legs for the 10km run. I didn´t have a good transition as I was right in the middle. I saw a horrific incident where the danish girl flew off her bike into the barrier. I ran my own pace for the first 1km in about 6th position. Unlike my last race, I ran a pace I felt I could hold and when I needed to I could react to surges and continue to run up the field. I never saw the front of the race as Emma Moffatt ran amazingly again away from the rest of us. With 1km to go I was running with Kathy, Nicola and Helen for the 2nd to 5th positions. With 500m to go Nicola increased her pace and opened up a 10m gap. My legs couldn´t go any faster but I ran as fast as I could to keep close and managed to run into 3rd place with a run time of 35.16.
1 Emma Moffatt AUS
2 Nicola Spirig SUI
3 Andrea Hewitt NZL
4 Kathy Tremblay CAN
5 Helen Tucker GBR
Also, Mr Celeste Milani drove from Milan to Kitzbuhel to personally give me a custom handmade Italian Milani bicycle, a black and red N107. Milani is a family business since 1927. The entire production of Milani bicycles is in Italy where they make their own carbon, their own design, build and paint the bicycles with a 15 person team. They also have a range of bikes - Milani for Maserati , so they really are the Formula 1 of bikes!
Yesterday, the day after the race, I went up the Hahnenkamm by Gondola and saw the famous downhill ski race course. The crazy decent takes less than 2 minutes to race down where they pick up speeds of over 100kmh after 6 seconds of leaving the top. I took the most scenic way down, by parapont. We flew over the small town of Kitzbuhel and had a safe landing in a field. He let me steer a bit but then he decided to spin round and round, not as relaxing as the nice floating feeling the rest of the way down.
Now I fly back to France, where I can't wait to start riding my new bike. Although, I have a week of recovery now before friday when I will head up to the French Pyrenees for 1 month of altitude training. I will be preparing for the London World Championship series in Font Romeu with Laurent Vidal.
