My second weekend racing road trip in a row took me to my home town of New Plymouth. This is a great event, now in its second year, which takes in the beautiful coastline that Taranaki has to offer (I’m not biased at all).  Similar to last year, it was just a brutal race.  I’d forgotten how testing the course is, it really is a complete contrast to the Port of Tauranga Half Ironman which is essentially a flat and fast race.  This is a real strongman’s course.  I ended up in 5th place, the same position as last year with similar contenders toeing the line again.  The race played out fairly similarly which was frustrating in the sense that  it gives the impression that I’ve not made huge performance gains in the 12 months since, and I do feel to some extent that I’m still losing the same battles. However, the reality is that I was beaten on the day by 4 other guys who are all full or nearly full time athletes coming off overseas campaigns, and most have more years’ racing experience under their belts. SWIM The two-lap 1900m swim in Port Taranaki started with a waist deep water start from Ngamotu Beach.  I’m always pretty comfortable with the swim here, being somewhere where I do a lot of open water training when I’m home in New Plymouth.  In addition, I usually link up with the race director Shorty Clark on the morning before the race and get the full low down on exactly where the buoys are going to be, the tide conditions, and what to sight for on the beach.  Apart from the taste of diesel on the surface, conditions were perfect with the sun rising through clouds to the east.  The start was pretty relaxed, like the event in general, and it was always going to be interesting to see how it played out as there were no real gun swimmers on the start list.  Bruce Hunter and Brodie Magdwick lead out hard, and I suffered a bit in the whitewash, losing some ground to the first buoy and, as usual, had to play chase for the rest of the swim.  The gap was sizeable by the time we exited the water after lap 1 and rounded the turn buoy on the beach. By this stage though I’d found my rhythm and settled into my work to chase the front pack. I exited the water with Tom Francis on my feet, and ran the 200m up the beach to T1. BIKE Transition went smoothly thanks to the big grassy area, being racked on a far end, and the ITU style boxes provided.  I managed to gap Tom Francis in transition, only to have him hammer past me on the first hill up to Paritutu.  I watched him ride away into the distance.   I was already struggling to get my quads working on the bike, finding I had to get out of the saddle on the hills constantly to keep momentum. I knew that burning matches to chase Tom would be a futile exercise if I wanted to be able to run. Tom is in stellar form coming off a US racing season and a Tour of Southland debut.  While the race plan had been to exit closer to the leaders and hang tight, in this predictable but less than ideal situation I needed to play my cards right and ride my own tempo.  Also on the first hill, Scott Thorne came past (another solid rider who is an Xterra MTB specialist).  Again, I was able to stick with him for a while but I just couldn’t dig deep enough to chase.  As I drifted further back the devil on my shoulder whispered about the irony of “losing” a 4.5 hour race only 35 mins in. I pushed the thoguhts aside and settled in to ride my own tempo, nutrition and power and wait for the run. As my coach said afterwards, if the legs aren’t good on the day, there’s not much you can do. In hindsight, the massage I had the day before the race perhaps wasn’t the best choice and it might have stirred up some toxins and given me that dead feeling. Anyway, I’m all too familiar with the punishing nature of the Surf Highway 45 bike course, and I hoped that some of the leaders might have underestimated it.  There was a slight tailwind on the way out, not as strong as last year, but enough to make saving extra watts for the way home a good idea. My ride out to the turn was completely solo, no other athletes in sight. This is one of the things I love about this race – it is a true time trial because the field is small, and a true test of racing character as a result. I downed my first electrolyte and caffeine bottle before Okato. In hindsight, putting down 200mg of caffeine in that bottle did help lift spirits for the lonely ride down the coast, but didn’t help the stomach settle come run time (excuse the pun, more on that later). As I ticked off the coastal towns and surf breaks and approached the Rahoutu turn point, I saw the leaders on their return. Leading was Brodie Madgwick followed by Bruce Hunter, a small gap to Keegan Williams, with Tom Francis a minute or so back with Scott Thorne not far behind. There was one other guy just in front of me and I quickly realised I was sitting 7th and the gap to the front was probably 4-5 minutes already. I managed to catch the rider in front after another 10 minutes during which it was useful to have someone to key off. I took on board another bottle of electrolyte at Okato and turned into the rollers and the headwind home.  The gap to the front by this stage was out to 10 minutes. I was pretty shocked by that, but solo riding without an unspoken consensus to lap it out tends to leave you drifting away like a feather on the wind. Unfortunately the rider I’d passed sat on my wheel (legally) into the wind all the way back to town. Thanks for taking a lap, mate. Although annoyed at the time that he wouldn’t come through, I knew he’d never see me again on the run. I was surprised that my legs really didn’t come together at all throughout the entire ride, and the last couple of hills forced me to dig pretty deep to keep the pace up. After the turn down Beach Road I focussed on spinning the legs out as much as possible. I crossed my fingers hoping that I could wipe the slate clean and write a new chapter on the run. RUN T2 was smooth and solid, I managed a good flying dismount and got a split to Keegan Williams up the road – 6 minutes. This was a bit disheartening as I knew there was almost no way I’d be able to put that much time into a guy with a pedigree like Keegan who would never blow unless for reasons of injury or wanting to rest the legs for IMNZ. Anyway, I downed a Horleys Replace gel, strapped on the Garmin and hit the button. Tap tap tap for the next 1 hr 20 mins. The skies were a little overcast but the sun was threatening to break through any minute. The steep kick up Bayley Road out of transition was not a pleasant start for my quads and I took a while to find my running legs. Once I found them though, I was surprised how good I felt. I was sitting comfortably at 3.45 pace on the flats, focussing on keeping the HR down. The volunteers on course were fantastic, very supportive and armed to the teeth with cups of electrolyte and Coke. I made a point of taking in the black stuff at every opportunity on the first lap to get some sugar into the bloodstream. I knew I was well hydrated and so it was simply a case of keeping the calories coming. By the end of the first lap, I’d tapped out a quick lap on about 1.15 pace, and knew from last year’s experience that 3 laps of the run is a different mental game to the usual two lap course where you take the first one easy and leave it all out there on the second. This required more careful pacing. The second time up Bayley Road I started to get some gut movements which weren’t ideal, and the caffeine load on the bike coupled with 3-4 cups of Coke had me scanning the horizon for a portaloo. Nothing in sight. I made a snap decision to duck down a driveway into some bushes and get rid of things – there was no way that I’d be able to hold on for another hour, let alone keep running at race pace. This was something I’ve never had to do in a race before. I lost about a minute in the process but it just had to be done. The stomach felt much better after that and I kept alternating electrolyte and Coke at the aid stations. The pace was starting to drop in sync with the increasing heat and fatigue. On lap two I passed Scott Thorne who was reduced to a walk, apparently having torn a calf muscle. When the leaders came the other way I could see that the small amount of time I’d put into Keegan Williams had been neutralised by my unplanned toilet stop, but I kept battling on. Lap three was a real death march, my pace dipped down to 4 min/km on the flat and I started to struggle with leg turnover. I kept in mind the advice of Kona 2011 runner-up Pete Jacobs about running tall with a proud chest and tried to stay light on my feet. I was doing it tough, but managed to enjoy the last few kms in the knowledge that I was safety in 5th place with large gaps in front and behind. I took the chance to thank the volunteers at the last few stations and spur on the other athletes on their first or second laps. The finishing straight was awesome, lots of high fives and support for me as first local boy home. During the long drag to the finish line, which seems like an eternity, I was reminded that this was the location of Bevan Docherty’s famous sprint victory over Kris Gemmell at the 2005 New Plymouth ITU World Cup. In writing this, I’ve realised that that was the first triathlon I ever watched in person, and that witnessing this was part of the reason I was drawn to the sport. It is well worth a watch: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xo-nbnw8zSI As Sam Warriner’s quote says at the start of that video, “Achievement is largely the product of raising one’s level of aspiration and expectation”. I came into this race with a raised level of aspiration and expectation, but couldn’t quite deliver the achievement I’d hoped for on the day. I’ll be back though. Thanks as always to my sponsors Ricoh NZ and Armstrong Sport.