Dunkerque French Grand Prix Triathlon

Last weekend I raced in a sprint distance triathlon in Dunkerque, the first round of the French GP series. It is a team competition format of 5 rounds and the best 3 individual results from each team determine the team's points for the round. I'm competing for Beauvais Triathlon for my third year racing in this series. We have finished 2nd behind Poissy Triathlon for the past 2 years. And again in Dunkerque we finished 2nd behind Poissy.
The Beauvais team chose a starting position right in the middle of the pontoon, just asking for a fight really which is exactly what happened when we dove into the water. I was struggling to swim for the first 200m to the first bouy as there was everyone swimming so close to each other. After the 750m, I exited 35sec behind the leader Jess Harrison FRA. As soon as I got on my bike I put on my bike shoes and put my hands on my drops and focused on getting my way to the front. I weaved around 10 or so who didn't manage to keep up and rode my way up to the front group of 10 with 4 others by the 8km mark. The remaining 12km of the bike was relatively easy and I came off the bike and out of T2 feeling good at the beginning of the run. Anja Dittmer GER pushed first then Magali Di Marco SUI, the first 1km was hard. But then everyone settled down and we comfortably ran together as a group. Directly in front of me, Emmie Charayron FRA tripped as she was running too close behind Anja with 300m to go and Erin Densham AUS, who ran up from 30sec behind, began the sprint and Anja followed quickly as Jodie Swallow GBR and I were a bit slower to chase. I crossed the line in 3rd place, really happy to have put together a strong race especially in the bike and run, still have to put in more work on my wetsuit swimming though.
And a huge congrats to Laurent who put together an awesome race to win the mens race.
I have lots to think about for Madrid which will most likely be a non wetsuit swim with 30deg estimated this Sunday. I travel from France to Madrid on Thursday and I am looking forward to catching up with John, my coach, who is coming to see the race from NZ. This weekend is an important race as it is part of the World Championship series in which all the races of the series accumulate points for the final World Championship ranking for 2009. A+
Andrea

The 1st World Champs Series race - A race to forget

I began the Tongyeong World Championship series race with a bad swim leg, then a crash on the first lap on the bike which resulted in losing contact with any group and caused my left bottom cheek to swell up all grazed.

I exited the water over 1 minute behind and at 2km on the bike I went down.

After I crashed I jumped straight back on my bike with my chain off, so had to get off again and fumble with my chain and of course by then the group was gone. I rode alone for 20km then decided to wait for the girl behind me as I was losing time by myself. It also hurt to go down on my aerobars with the burn on my forearm, and I didn't feel like I was riding well. I waited for Supanova UKR who was chasing behind me. But when I got onto the run, there was no energy, I felt flat and each time I took on water, it touched my burn and it stung. So, a race to forget about. I will keep dry for the next 5 days at least and heal.

Now I am a supporter, I will cheer on Laurent in the mens race!

Allez Laurent :)

Bye bye NZ

I arrived in South Korea last night for the first event of my 2009 overseas race season. On Saturday is the Tongyeong Triathlon World Championship series race 1. At breakfast this morning, I had an interview with Peter Holmes from ITU media. It is posted on www.triathlon.org . I see my sister, Sara, in Dubai has already seen it and has put a link to it from her facebook :)thanks sis. Yesterday I landed at Busan airport, then there was a 2 hours drive to Tongyeong. So at 12.30pm when I arrived at the hotel, I crashed straight in bed.But I was woken up, first at 6am, then at 7am from work beginning in the harbour directly outside of my room. I am unfazed by most things when I sleep, but the bed here has the hardest mattress ever, so it was difficult to get comfy again to go back to sleep. At 7am I was awake and not sleepy, the jetlag for me here is going to be more at night, because of travelling 3 hours backwards. At 7pm it is 10pm in NZ so over dinner I'm sure I'll be falling asleep. I rode to the swimming pool after breakfast and rode back, stopping off at Familymart for some lunch. I like the takeaway triangle sushi but I'm not sure about the sweet bread. And lunch cost 10000 won, the inflation must have been high here at some point.. The World Championship series events all have live coverage in the country of the event. But if you aren't in Korea, then you can watch the live coverage on the internet on this Saturday 2nd May on www.triathlon.org . It starts at 1.55pm local time = 4.55pm NZ time, and the mens race is on Sunday. The Olympic distance triathlon 1500m swim 40km bike 10km run will take around 2 hrs and there will be coverage on Sky Sport in NZ sometime too. Take care, Andrea