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Triathlon is
not just training, resting, focusing and a little talent, its about
having a good time and enduring the tough times. I say this based on
always looking at the big picture. The big picture? What’s the big
Picture?
Good Question.
I believe it’s a balance in life, family, Goals and a mighty good
time.
Exactly that,
the goal here is to realize why I am doing this. For me, this is a
simple thing. Growing up in Australia makes me realize that good
times and parties and get togethers were the common every day
occurrence. Thus being a solid foundation of success in achieving
ones goal.
I found that in
Racing in general as a professional athlete there were way too many
interfering factors, there fore creating confusing pathways. You
see, you have a goal right? Right. So focus on that but don’t lose
sight of the big picture, LIFE.
I write this
column because its fun, I like to share, I like to laugh and I like
having a chat.
I am going to
share a couple of stories with you about the year of 1989.
1989 was my
breakthrough year. It was also a year where I signed up for frequent
flyer mileage too, (goodness know how many miles I missed out on by
not putting my boarding cards in).
I was named to
the Australian Triathlon team for the inaugural Triathlon World
Championship in Avignon France. I was actually the last to be named
on the team that would win the Men’s Team event shared with Mark
Allen’s Team USA ( Mark won the race, Smarty Pants).
I had never
really traveled much so this trip to France to starts things off was
monumental.
We (The Aussie
Team, Brad Beven, Nick Croft, Spot Anderson, Miles Stewart, Sue
Turner and Louise Bonham and our Illustrious leader Geoff Frost,
Team Manager, and spoke a tad of French) boarded the Singapore
airlines flight bound for Paris via every possible stop on earth,
Singapore, Bahrain, Rome and finally touching in down in Paris a
scant and very weary 36 hours later.
By now my
energy was being tested.
As we claimed
what seemed to be half the planes luggage descended Charles De
Gaulle escalators to the subway. If you have ever traveled on a
train, then you know they go like clock work, right? As the train
arrived we scuffled our excesses of luggage much to the demise of
the Parisiens. We literally shoved our gear in and stuffed the entry
ways full before the doors shut. What a production.
At the other
end which was Gare De Lyon, we again pushed our crap out and tried
to regain some order.
Then the news
of the day. The Manager could only purchase 5 tickets on the TGV (
very fast train) and had told me as team captain that he wanted me
to rent a truck , Take Brad and Nick with me , take all the luggage
and drive 400km’s (248miles, I’m bi-lingual, Aussie and American) to
our central region destination of Macon, famous for its Burgundy
wine.
Being the proud
owner of a brand spankin new Mastercard my first entry was a $400
rental van in France. We loaded the truck up to the brim full of
bike bags and masses of luggage and off to the auto route we go. It
was my first time driving on the other side of the road so the boy’s
were on navigational duties; well they were supposed to be anyway.
No sooner had I got into the first intersection, Paris was living up
to its traffic reputation and it took us 90 minutes to go 3 miles.
Once on the
auto route however, things started to feel normal again. So much for
the company though. The boys had nodded off into oblivion and I was
left to deal with The Alain Prost and Micheal Schumacher’s of the
road. My sluggish rental was doing its best to keep up but hey, I
was having a blast just trying to stay out of harms way, plus these
new sporty cars were just incredible to see.
Driver fatigue
was setting in so I decided to wake my lazy counterparts and ask
them to help out with the driving.
Crofty
volunteered and the reigns were all his.
We climbed back
on the freeway and I slowly dozed off, by the way, Brad hadn’t woken
from his hibernation yet! Crofty seemed to be doing all right but at
15minutes into his spell we drifted off the road and down an
embankment, I woke to my head banging on the door and being thrown
up and down as if I was riding a mechanical bull.
Ok, Crofty,
outta the saddle mate, go back to sleep you go. So team captain
climbed aboard for round two. Our journey from there was uneventful
outside of trying to locate our homestays. So finally after 5 hours
on the road we reached our destination. After Nick volunteering to
call them to get directions, his French wasn’t cut out to be what he
said it was. He called the work number of our homestay and all he
got was the janitor who much to our demise spoke no, Par le vous
Anglais!
We had no
choice but to get a hotel room for the night and seek our Families
the next morning, after all the trip was now 48hours and next to no
sleep.
We found a
hotel that was open with a little old lady sitting in the window
knitting. We lazy inexperienced travelers stumbled in and asked for
a room. After looking at us a little strange, she agreed to give
us a room as she only had had one room left. Guess what? Yep, one
bed baby!! Yee Haa, giddy up! Picture this? Three rock solid young
triathletes after a smelly and sweaty trip shacked up in a double
bed! OOOh yeh, no pictures I’m sorry.
It was a
classic night. After much turning and re-arranging, I had noticed
while I went to the bath room that Nick had thrown a leg and an arm
over Brad and they were sleeping soundly, How Cute! Brad blamed Nick
for rubbing his leg up a bit too!
This was such a
great trip and some of my greatest memories, and therefore giving
you an idea that its all about fun.
The next
morning a search party was sent to find the Aussies but they need
not go to far, the word was out on the street that these young sweet
and very innocent young lads were at the Star Hotel.
We did a three
race warm up for worlds which included Macon that very first
weekend. I won as Brad Flatted in the first 5 k of the bike but
climbed back into 3rd overall. My run split was 29.50 and
it wasn’t short (NOT).
Our homestay
families also agreed that the winner’s family would have to bring
out their best kept bottle of wine to celebrate and so they did with
an all night party and laughs were had.
On from there
and another two races before world championships I won the next and
finished 2nd to Rob Barel in Munich for the next race,
and by the way Rob, no elbowing the short guy next time in the shute
mate!!!
The worlds had
finally arrived and the Aussie team was primed. We had been
competing well on a whole but I was cleaning up! This was totally
unexpected; I was the final pick on the team and felt lucky to be
there, thus the reason for success I guess! The Worlds didn’t quite
turn out the way I had hoped but it sure was fun sprinting with
Kenny Glah down the finish line. We took 45th and 46th
with the little Aussie edging the flaming Glah. Kenny is an example
of this article; the guy is amazing and still going strong.
Then it was on
to Vancouver, Chicago and Toronto before heading back to the land
down under and finally get back to reality, WORK. Had a 3rd
to Kenny and Mike Pigg in Vancouver ( one of my favourite places on
earth) then had a Barry Crocker (shocker, a race to forget) in
Chicago but finished on a great note in Toronto.
Graham Fraser
has been organizing races since he was in Diapers (Last year) and we
were invited to The Reebok World Triathlon in Milton, just outside
of Graham’s home town.
Had another
tussle with Piggy but it was the flying Kiwi Rick Wells a former
Commonwealth 200m freestyle swimmer who blasted out of the bush to
take the race. I ended up earning as much money in 8 weeks in 7
races as I earned all year at work. Suffice to say what I was
thinking!!!!
After a
marathon flight to Sydney from North America (28 hours) I panicked a
bit about the length of time it was to Kona. I had already competed
twice on the Big Island and had considered racing professionally.
Still with no
real expectations of competing well with limited training as I
worked 10 hours in construction every day, I felt that I just needed
to do a little bit of training, not a heck of a lot.
With only 4
weeks remaining now, I felt that I need not alter my schedule so I
worked weekends as we had a ton of work on, so after Saturdays at
work I used to meet some friends, well the ones that were willing,
or stupid! We would go to the sand hills by my home in Cronulla and
run them for around an hour and a half, yep, straight up and down
the dreaded sand hills. It was hot and it was hard. Almost vertical
climbing made it impossible to run them so you were reduced to
putting your hands on your knees and push them summoning all
strength… you may start to question me but there was a method behind
this madness. It was like doing a set of hill repeats on the bike
strictly working on quad, calf and core strength. It was almost like
going to the gym and doing a set of squats for 1.5 hours.
This was one of
my favorite workouts plus I got to spend time with my friends.
My limited
training for Kona this particular year seemed to pay off as I was 3rd
to IRONWAR. The Mark and Dave show was happening up ahead much to my
ignorance. Mark and Dave were locked in Battle as they swam, biked
and ran stride for stride until mark finally made his move on the
Man and cracked him a mile form Palani Road.
I was a distant
20 minutes back passing Kenny Glah a half mile to go for 3rd and the
Flying Finn Pauli Kiuru nearly caught Kenny too. I didn’t look back
at all, I had no Idea he was coming.
Mate, these
were the good times and just to finish off, I was invited to the
Post race press conference which was held the day after. I rocked up
happy as can be and I sat next to my 2 Idols, The Man and the
Zenmaster, do you think I was intimidated? Yep, got that right!
Bob Babbitt
from Competitor Magazine asked me a few questions about juggling a
job as a construction worker and Triathlon. My reply was simply, I’m
not a triathlete mate I’m a bloody worker! It just so happened that
I had a good race on the day.
My season with
the Aussie team in Europe and North America however changed my mind
forever, I soon became a pro Triathlete and can honestly say it’s
the best job you could ever have, if you’re not afraid of hard work
that is!
May all your
experiences in Kona or any Ironman be a good time, let it roll baby!
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