2006 World Age-Group Championships Report

Thursday, September 07 2006 @ 06:00 PM IST

We flew to Switzerland on Wednesday. Despite dire predictions, nobody had any difficulty getting their bicycle on the plane. The short train journey from Geneva airport to Lausanne was completely painless - good old Swiss efficiency. I was staying in hotel Les Croisée on Avenue Marc Dufour. Conveniently located near the train station, the views of the lake and mountains from the balcony were breath-taking.

On Thursday morning we did the escorted tour of the bike course. At the meeting point I met a guy born in Ireland, but racing for the Canadian age group team. Funnily enough, as I told him, I was born in Canada and racing for the Irish team. Sometimes the world can seem very small. We had a good look at the climbs and descents. There was only one climb with a gradient greater than 10% and it was short enough to power through. Some of the descents were quite fast and narrow, but on the sharp turns (mostly at the bottom of steep descents) there were plenty of hay bales and crash barriers...

We registered after lunch and then attended the team briefing with Irish team manager Neil O'Brien. We discovered that the transition from swim to bike was 1.6k and from bike to run 800m. That's a whole lot of carbon! Later that evening the team met up for the parade of nations. The atmosphere was fantastic, with big numbers from the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Great Britain. Complete with bagpipers and cheering crowds it was like one big party (check out the video). I took a walk along the run course that night before going to the athlete's pasta party (where I ate way too much lasagna, but as they say in these parts 'Je Ne Regrette Rien' :-).

Had a bit of a bike disaster the following morning. Before my training spin, one of the spokes on my front wheel snapped and the wheel buckled while braking on the descent to the lake shore. Went for a swim that AM instead of my planned cycle. Made sure to take note of sighting landmarks and practiced my start from the pontoon, turns around the buoys and swim exit into transition. The wheel couldn't be repaired without removing the deep-set rim, so I had to get a replacement. I think the wheel must have been damaged in the accident I had earlier this year in Autun. Was pretty put out at first but decided it was better to happen on Friday than on one of the descents during the race. Neil O'Brien got in touch with a guy called Chris, from the New Zealand squad, who loaned me a lovely Ksyrium front wheel just in time for the bike to be checked into transition before 6pm.

Had an early night before race day and was up in time for a (smaller than usual) 8am breakfast. My wave wasn't off until 10:55, so I didn't go into the holding area until just after 9am. I prepped my transition area, leaving plenty of time to stretch, before we lined up on the pontoon. The men's 30-34 age-group had over 140 people in the wave, so everyone knew it was going to be a rough start. Only 3 strokes into the swim I was elbowed in the face. My lower jaw hurt and I could taste blood in my mouth, but the distraction seemed to help as I wasn't put off by any further rough and tumble in the pack. Although I didn't know it at the time, I ended up doing one of my best swim times of the season.

Mick McGloin had said he was going to catch me in transition one, so I was well motivated to keep the pace high. I knew a 1.6k run on the road would slow a lot of people, so I had planned to remove my wetsuit early and keep up a fast pace. This worked well and I made up time on a lot of people. Transition to the bike went smoothly and I quickly got up to speed once out on the road. Felt very good on the hills and I was passing people. On the downhills I had already planned where to brake for all the sharp turns and caught a few more people. The Irish supporters were out in big numbers and they gave us a huge lift every time we passed them. I had one worrying incident with a small speed wobble skid after leaving braking just a little late, but other than that things ran smoothly. My pace slackened a bit at the end of the cycle course when I hit roads that I hadn't really practiced on, but I kept my position on the way into transition two.

The run was fairly warm and I made sure to drink on every lap. Ray, Eoin and a few of the guys from earlier waves were already out on the run course. Everybody was working hard and there was no banter (except from the enthusiastic supporters). Using a heart rate monitor I kept my heart rate between 155 and 160bpm. At this point I spotted Mick McGloin hot on my heels. Although I was finding it hard work, I was running fairly steadily and decided to up the pace in the third lap (162/163 bpm). This gave me my fastest lap, but meant that I slowed up substantially for the following kilometer. Archie from Belpark came level with me at this point. He was one lap back, but running with him kept my pace steady. With less than 2k to go I picked up the pace again (catching Philip King) and only just beating a sneaky French guy to the line in a sprint finish.

It sounds corny, but just participating in the event was the real highlight for me. The scale of the field and the number of different nationalities gave the race an exciting international feel. There was lots of emotion, with large numbers of friends and family supporting along the course. The athletes with a disability were inspiring to see and the standard of competition was very high. That night the whole Irish team (and supporters) met up in a local restaurant for a very nice meal, some tall tales and some even taller pints of beer. A few of us even made it to the local night club.

Now all I have to do is survive Kenmare this Saturday...

Related Links
Irish Team Results
Club Photo Gallery
Tri Lausanne Homepage
International Triathlon Union website
Triathlon Ireland Story
Video Highlights
Official ITU Photos

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