Subic Bay ASTC Triathlon Asian Championships

Since coming back from Palembang, I had a good few weeks to put in a bit of solid training before the Asian Championships came up. It was a great timing to have Radka Vodičková stop by for a few days in KL (before heading off to Vietnam and San Diego). Definitely a quality few days of training for me.
Not long after, it was packing time and off to Subic Bay. We would've preferred flying some nights earlier, but Friday morning flight seemed much better than a Thursday night flight (plus it arrived on Friday midnight anyway).

It was definitely a very rushed and tiring day. Delayed flight and time costing immigration meant arriving late for kit check - rushing through the bike set up - quick lunch - bike test - little swim - shower - briefing - dinner - water/food shopping - change of rooms due to broken aircond - race kit packing - sleep. (Try not to sing through that with the "Friday" song..)
So our original structured day plan was trashed..
Come to think of it that was one hell of a day!!

We were up very early (most of us would consider it as midnight) at 3am for a little bit of food and dropping off our shoes and T2 equipment at our allocated spots along a massive stretch. T1 and T2 areas were 10km apart.

Had a good warm up spin to Dungaree Beach swim start, and a bigger swim warm up this time (to avoid Geelong all over again!). I definitely felt a little drained from all the travelling and stress from the rush, with literally no time to settle in. Felt good though so that's alright.

49 Junior Elites on the start list. That's a record breaker for me! Unfortunately for me I had to take the inner start, knowing I would have everyone swimming into me. Lacked a strong start in the first 100m of the swim, meaning I was absolutely battered with 40 or so guys squeezing in.

It was a full-on war, people swimming over me, pushing me into the lane ropes, pulling, kicking and one-eyeing the swim after a kick leaked water into my left goggle. By the time it had settled, I was in a
smaller group of 5 about 50sec down the leaders, somewhere in the 20th placings. I would say my start dictated my race outcome. Not a bad swim, but could've been better.. Though a 9:30 swim is definitely reassuring especially after Geelong!

Onto the bike, there wasn't much of sitting around with all of us sharing the load throughout the 10km +8km rough, sandy loop, shorter than the usual 20km (the 200m long stretch to transition makes up for it though!). Legs felt strong from the start to the end so I put in a bit of work as well to keep to pace going. A large pack tried to chase us down but we managed to hold them off all the way to the end. Nearly lost my group twice. Once riding through a large patch of sand, and another after missing the U-Turn point. Other than that the we stayed together the whole way, picking up some other bikers we caught up to. Putting in those Watts was sure to do some damage on the run. At this point I knew I didn't have the legs to run with most of these guys, but I did what I could, saving as much as I can before the dismount.

Immediately off the bike the group took off to leave me solo, running at a more reasonable and manageable pace. A stitch came on early and never went away, but I kept the pace going the first lap, and gritted my teeth as I pushed harder, speeding up on the second lap and managed to narrow the gap to my group but not enough to finish with them. Probably the smartest thing I did, knowing I would have blown up if I went off too fast too early, proven when I caught back and also overtook some competitors in the end to finish in 21st positioning.

Mixed feelings with this race. Glad that my race went pretty well, but not what I had expected in the field and ranking.. To know that a better starting could of potentially made a significant difference to my placing. Initially really disappointed with how it went until the results and splits came out, which proved otherwise. Something to learn from, but never to dwell on!
No thanks to Matt Denby, Leon Knight and Benjamin Ross Proud for distracting me with endless Candy Crush requests.. (Just kidding, but NO I don't want to play!)

So now I'm back in KL and ready to take on a good solid block of training, entering myself into some good races here in KL. I know what's missing now after a great experience in the competitive field, where the gaps need filling and to continue building blocks. Glad to be back home after a fast paced weekend! Looking forward to the Malakoff Duathlon Series this May and some more ITU racing after!

Once again huge thanks to Team MET sponsors, Rudy Project, CEEPO, K-Swiss for their wonderful support as always.