Race 3 AJTS Devonport 2016

I walked into this race with an expectation to place in the top 10, even though it was my first race of the Australia Junior Triathlon Series, I was more than confident that I would have a strong performance and do my parents proud as I always strive to do. The race was scheduled to start at 11.30am on Saturday the 20th of February. As I’ve mentioned in previous race reports, I do struggle to get into ‘the zone’ when it comes to racing, so unfortunately I couldn’t completely focus

until the signal to start had gone. I am determined to find out why this is so and hopefully when I find the solution I will start having better performances.

When the morning of the race came, I was so happy that I didn't have to have an early wake up. Instead I was finally able to have a day where I could have a sleep in. I woke up around 8am and pretty much sat around doing nothing in my hotel room until I had to leave for the race. It was good only staying a few km's away from the race venue which allowed me to do my bike warm up on the way to the race. Once I arrived at the race venue, I went and found Legendary Lisa (Lisa Ouwendyk) and got her to braid my hair as she does for every race I compete in. The event was running about 15 minutes behind schedule so I made sure that I adjusted my warm up to suit the event schedule. Even though my event was due to start 15 minutes later than what was originally planned, I was still rushed around before my event. Even though they were behind schedule they still stuck to the normal schedule time. This did in fact mess with my pre race plan as I had to rush to get my wetsuit on and go for a swim warm up in a time space of 5 minutes before my event was due to start. Once my wetsuit was on, I ran down to the beach, dove into the water and went through a couple of sprints to get the blood flowing before my race. 

For the swim start, we had to line up along the shoreline with our hand on a bar. I was one of the last people to head down to the start which resulted in not having the best position. As the race starter gave us the ready, I knew I had to focus and that I couldn’t stuff up this race. He sounded the signal and myself and 23 other girls ran into the cold ocean water. Unfortunately I didn’t have the best start and I thought that it was all gone, my chances of racing well was all over, but I wasn’t going to let a poor swim start stop me. I can remember diving into the freezing water and giving my body a shock, it was hard to breathe, but I knew that I had to keep calm. After the first 100 or so metres, I managed to find clear water and swam from the very back of the pack all the way to the front up with the leaders by the last turning buoy. This was it, I wanted to get out of the swim with the front pack and I knew that I would be able to hang on, on the bike leg. I came out of the water with Brittany Dutton and Sophie Malowiecki right in front of me, ran into transition with the front pack, sighted my bike and ran to it. I hadn’t done much training in my wetsuit and that definitely reflected on my performance in transition. I just couldn’t get my wetsuit off over my left ankle that had a massive timing chip on it. I was panicking and looked to my left, only to see the pack that I had come out with in the swim running out of transition onto the bike to ride four laps of a 5km course. After what had seemed like a long time, I managed to get my foot out of my wetsuit, put my helmet on, grabbed my bike and ran out of transition only just missing the front pack. 

I knew that I could make up time on the bike and catch up to the lead pack as the bike leg is one of my strongest legs. I remember my quads screaming, burning and being exhausted, questioning myself whether I had gone out too hard in the swim. There were endless negative thoughts running through my mind as I saw the lead pack get away, however after about 2km I jumped onto the back of the pack and honestly I was struggling to hold on but I had to dig deep. As we turned left on the bike course, there it was, that massive hill that everyone had been talking about, a 7.4% gradient and 500m long that had to be ridden up four times throughout the 20km bike leg. I knew that I had to stay with the front pack otherwise my race would be all over. As we started the incline I was already struggling but I honestly tried hard to stay with the group, but my legs were just grinding along to the point where I may as well have stopped. The group quickly dropped me and the race was just pretty much over, however I didn’t want to pull out of the race, no matter how painful, I wanted to keep on going. It brought tears to my eyes, the amount of pain I was going through simply because I knew in that moment that I had let everyone down who believed in me but most of all I had let down myself. I got to the top of the hill and uncontrollably broke down crying, unable to breathe, upset…the negative thoughts were just taking over my mind. I kept on riding, turned around at the turn around and headed back down the hill. On the second lap of the bike I was able to jump onto the second pack but unfortunately the same thing happened and they dropped me up the hill. I was still crying, upset and wanting to just give up. However, I had to fight the thoughts that were telling me to give up because as a Wesley, I never give up no matter what. I basically ended up riding the 20km draft legal bike leg solo TT-ing it. Every lap I could see the lead pack put more and more time into me. Throughout the bike leg all I could think about was how I had let my coach and friends down, but most of all my parents. After everything they had done to help me get this far, I had let them down. I was most definitely in the wrong mental state but there wasn’t much I could do about it except to keep on going. “You may see me struggle but you will never see me quit”. 

Finally after four laps of mental break downs, I came into the dismount line, dismounted and sprinted to my place in transition where I racked my bike, put my run shoes on, grabbed my hat and ran hard out of transition with everyone cheering me on. Despite all of the negative thoughts that were constantly running through my mind, I had to put that all behind me as I settled into a pace that I thought was reasonable and ran through the sweat, pain and tears. The run was two 2.5km laps that equaled to a 5km run leg. I felt pretty good on the run and was making up as much time as I possibly could. I was trying hard to catch the two girls in front of me who had put over 30 seconds into me. Kurt was there cheering me on every single lap, telling me that I could catch up to the girls in front of me and was giving me the motivation that I had lost. As the last lap of the run was nearing I caught up to the two girls in front of me, giving it everything that I had left in me for the last 700m, absolutely busting my guts. The finish line was in sight and I honestly don’t know what happened but I just stopped giving it my all and let the other two girls beat me. I crossed the finish line in 17th place and only to find myself having tears running out of my eyes. I really wanted to hold it all in as my dad always tells me not to show everyone that I’m upset but I went and sat down and just broke down crying, simply because I was afraid of what my parents would say as I knew that I had let them down. Of course I was upset with myself also as I know that I can perform better than that. However, I would like to thank all the people who came and comforted me after my race and helping me get into a positive mind set. After a while of settling down, I went and congratulated the other competitors on their amazing efforts. 

This is possibly one of the toughest triathlons I’ve ever competed in and I’m not going to lie, it wasn’t the race for me and I had a pretty poor performance. I’m not going to state the exact words that were going through my mind at the time of the race but I can’t let one race tear me down and let me give up. It’s all a learning experience and I’m only going to get better. You have your good races and your bad races and its the things that you take away from the experience that make you a better athlete. I am looking forward to the races that I have ahead of me and hopefully next season in the Australian Junior Triathlon Series, I will come back as a stronger athlete mentally and physically.

I would like to thank Stuart and Bonnie from Eclipse Fitness for their on going coaching and support, my parents and family for helping me get to where I am today. To my friends at training who are always pushing me to go harder, thank you and thanks to Legendary Lisa for always braiding my hair :)