A'Formosa Olympic Distance Tri

(Photos courtesy of Tey, Ivie and Shilpa)

For the first time I can remember I had trouble sleeping before a Olympic Distance race. I was also paranoid of oversleeping - ironically I woke up half an hour AFTER my alarm was supposed to go off. Fortunately I was reasonably well organised and after the requisite 3 cups of coffee and a "sit down" I was ready to go.

I had a great allocated spot for my bike near to the exit of transition - I had to cover the same distance as everyone else but it meant less running with the bike. The swim was two loops and extremely well marked with buoys and rope all the way around (nice job Mr Chan). I was ready, all was looking good, now it was time to see what we could do.

The gun went and we were off but after about 150 metres I got well beaten up, my left goggle go hit and filled with water and I swallowed what felt like a gallon of lake water. I had to tread water for a few seconds just to stay alive but was soon back into it. The swim was great and as with the day before I stayed focused throughout, concentrating on technique, navigation and even trying to draft at times. Often my attention wanders a little in the swim as I'm pretty rubbish at it if the truth be told - today though I kept it together.

I came out a second behind Randy (he did say he had his worst swim ever though). However, Wong At Thiam and Shahrom were behind me and I soon caught Iwata-san, Kevin and Cecil on the bike. Again this reinforced my great swim as usually I don't catch them until much later on the bike.







I chose my moment and then accelerated up a hill and dropped the pack of about 10 riders. One western guy came with me and I backed off a bit to let him catch up. We then worked together until the turnaround - I was just doing whatever I could to put some distance between myself and the pack (and in particularly Iwata - my main challenger). Then I looked behind and I saw two riders right on my tail, I was so disappointed to have been caught - but then as they went past I realised that it was Shahrom and Wong At Thiam, (Malaysia's best duathlete and long course triathlete, respectively). Things were turning out rather well!!!

The four of us shared the work all the way to the finish of the bike catching and passing a few riders on the way - we caught Wei and his group right at T2 but boy can these guys run. They dropped me like a bad date but still Iwata was behind me and I had to keep it together.

The first third of the run was good, I felt strong and fast but the second third really exposed my lack of running mileage - I was suffering. I eventually caught a Singaporean but then couldn't drop him. Then something strange happened, with 3k to go I felt light and strong again, my stride length increased and my cadence sped up - I was flying - by the time I went over the finish line the Singaporean guy was several hundred meters behind. GOLLY, how did that happen?






























I'd beaten Iwata-san who was very gracious in defeat, I have a huge respect for this guy, which has grown greatly over the years.

It soon became clear that I was second in the 40-49 age-group, a guy that we'd never seen before had finished miles ahead of me and deservedly won the category - not sure who he is or where he's from but clearly another mountain to climb - BRING IT ON!





At the prize-giving, Sid and Seb seemed really impressed with the trophy, so much so that Seb clung on to it with a vice-like grip; not to be outdone Sid went to the stage and picked up someone elses trophy and bought it back to a rather embarrassed mummy and daddy - THAT'S MY BOY!