Leading into Ironman Australia i had put together a pretty good summer of training behind me in Sydney, things seemed to be going well.
I also entered Ironman Melbourne as i thought that i might have a chance to sneak in a good race down there to put me in good stance to qualify for Ironman Hawaii.
Now looking back at that first move to race Melbourne, i was probably about 3 weeks shy of being race ready, and with a field like melbourne i should of really known better.
So onwards and upwards, unfortunately i didn't finish Melbourne suffering bad cramps in my hip flexors and quads so i had to pull the pin, this gave me some adequate time to work on some kinks to polish me off and to get me ready for Ironman Australia.
Ironman Australia, everything seemed to be on track, so i approached the race with some confidence and a different race plan to Melbourne.
My plan was to stick to a constant pace, don't worry so much about the factors around like the other athletes, just put together a race without any spikes in my threshold.
Problem with spiking, surging pushing myself outside the comfort zone, is that in a full ironman you can pay for it later down the track, and pay big!
I felt like this was my problem with a race like Melbourne that i got so caught up with athletes around that i lost focus of my race plan ahead.
Ironman Australia; Everything looked like it was going ok, Bell and the french guy got a lead out of the swim on me, with Bell extending his lead even more on the bike.
I wasn't too concerned by the closing stages of the bike, i had kept to my race plan which was staying at an even threshold and i'd passed the french athlete so i was in 2nd with Bell having a considerable lead on the bike.
Starting the marathon in 2nd i wasn't too concerned about Bells lead, i knew he was racing 'scared' so to speak, not so much scared of us athletes, I think he was pushing too hard as he wasn't confident with his back end marathon trying to give himself a big buffer over the rest of us.
Unfortunately for him, it didn't pay off and he was reduced to walking.
My marathon started off a little shaky, my back had seized up for the first 15km of the run (i believe from sleeping on a bad hotel bed) which now looking back at the end result probably cost me the win at the end of the day.
The canadian guy who won, was a relatively unknown athlete to me, though it didn't matter if i knew him or not as i raced the way i raced despite my competition.
I eventually caught bell like i thought in the early stages of the 2nd half marathon, but unfortunately for me running so slow in the first half marathon till by back loosed up, i had lost quite some considerable time to the fast running canadian, so as i was just getting into first place, this would only be for a matter of seconds as the canadian was already shoulder-shoulder to take the lead for himself.
By the closing stages of the marathon, the race looked like it was set in stone, the canadian was running well, but only slightly quicker than me, but it was enough for him to take the win.
I am still pleased with my race, as allot of my own analysis into my race, was mostly "cosmetic work" like having a good bed to sleep on, which could've been a 5min advantage enough to be the difference from winning to 2nd place.
Another bonus is that i was the first Australian, so technically that's my 2nd Australian title ;)
