Burabay ASTC Triathlon Junior Asian Championships

Kazakhstan… Who would’ve ever thought to take such lengths to fly there for a race, let alone travel for any other reason? Yet again, who shouldn’t?

Possibly an overlooked destination of choice for tourism, it’s immensely large land is decorated beautifully from the spectacular view of the Kazakh Alps peaking through the frothy coat of clouds from the plane window, it’s dead-flat lands like a blanket of wheat fields that stretches out to the end of the world, architectural wonders of the young city of Astana, the beauty of its postcard-like, picturesque environment, and just so much more. Having said that however, it certainly does add a bit of ounce of difficulty with hardly any airline operators flying there, and with no one speaking English.

A full day of travelling was laid out for our team on the Wednesday 29^th of May, to which we were given an immediate environmental shock upon arrival at Astana with its (very) chilly climate and lack of development on it’s big plain fields, speaking from the perspective of our youths that have grown up around apartments, shopping complex’s and everything else we deem “normal”. A 3hr drive from the airport took us into deep into the woods before opening into Burabay town, far from any “tourist areas” & major developments. I was surprised that such an area so far from modern civilization would be populated, and even have their own little zoo!

Let's all just stop and cry at the beauty

The race-course was situated by a breathtakingly scenic location (I forget its name) with a lake that reached out towards mountains that touched the clear blue sky, layered with pine trees everywhere. The actual swim in the lake was nothing alike.. A water temperature of 13C lake and strong gusts of icy winds played throughout the few days, so cold that we couldn't stand still, nor "thahlk phroptherly" with numbed lips, our necks ached from shivering so violently. Just imagine us going "this pthrase, iths thso pheauthifhul!" and cracking up midway through any sentence. It was however, a beautiful clear blue sky on race day.  The showers had no hot water for the first 2 nights and alternated randomly after that, which I’m sure no one enjoyed anymore than I did. At least we had great ice-baths? Just kidding, I didn't shower for 3 days straight.

There was an opening ceremony on the Friday night and one person from each country had to be chosen as the country's flag bearer. It was I... 

I did not expect it to be so grand and I admit I was probably more nervous about this than anything else. Each country was called out and I panicked when the flag wrapped itself up and kept flapping in my face as I walked around the hall. How embarrassing!

The youths were gunned off in the morning, leaving the Elite Juniors to start in the warm afternoon. And it actually was warm!

With the generous time till our race, I retreated to my room after breakfast, popped my headphones and lay down on my bed, thinking through and visualizing the race.

It was a small field of only 28 men, but was no less aggressive than any other large-scale race. It was a fight through the choppy waters from the horn blast, and I was forcibly stopped twice, with lots of swimming over each other and hands catching and pulling on shoulders. I tried to keep myself calm and hold back from hitting the red-zone too early, but I might have held back a bit too much!

Busted my gut chasing him

I hopped out of the water 10sec down from a Japanese and 30sec down from the chase group. The wetsuit came off quick in T1 and I nailed my legs down right from the mount-line, up the long climb and gassed myself to chase the Japanese and the pack. I got into an aero position immediately after the hill and busted a gut chasing what seemed like a hopeless endeavor, as it seemed to do nothing but maintain the gap for the first 4km. I don’t think I have ever pushed this hard in any race, triathlon or road cycling itself and I was shocked to have actually caught them before the end of lap 1! The 4 of us continued to hammer down with the Japanese and I leading the majority of the time. Eventually we caught another 2 upfront, and slowly reeled in another pack further in front. Again, the Japanese and I worked most of the way despite the increase in size. I stayed up at the front as much as I could, going into narrow U-turns and tight corners to stay out of any trouble and knowing it was less effort to be chased out of those U-turns as opposed to the other way round. A 5-600m long hill at every loop played in my favour, as I knew I would be spending fewer watts than the others at each climb. By the 3^rd and final loop, our hard work had paid off as we caught the group upfront. I got to the front of our pack (again to stay out of trouble), dismounted and had one of the quickest transitions of my life!

I blasted out of T2 together with the pack in front of us. The legs were feeling very heavy and in pain at this point with all the lactic from that intense ride, but somehow I was able to keep a great form with a very high turnover. I immediately outran all in my group as well as the other, except for the one Japanese that work equally as hard as me on the bike! I was worried I had gone off too quick on the first loop, but managed to keep the form and position all the way into the finish line to finish 14^th place. I was also happy to later learn that I had finished 4^th country-wise, after Kazakhstan, Hong Kong, and Japan!

Pretty happy with a solid performance and how I dealt with the different situations that came before me, especially on the bike and run. A smart ride got me saving more energy without any unnecessary expenditure at technical points and played with my advantage well at the hills. Of course, having Steve shout to me about the gap difference between us and the pack in front at every lap was what motivated me to push so hard! If not, I wouldn't have believed we could catch that group, and the results would have been so different! 

I ran hard and left nothing back. The swim however, still needs plenty more work but is something I am confident about, as long as I commit to putting the work in over the long period I will be in this sport!

It was probably the most fun as well, messing about at every chance we had (which you could probably tell from our ridiculous selfie's and videos). Wrapping Henry up at the airport was the best idea ever. We're wrapping him up completely at the next chance we get. Seriously.

Have a laugh:
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=800469316639497

I have to thank the organisers for putting together such a great race at such a spectacular venue, our coaches and parents for looking after us so well and organising this trip (which was absolutely hectic), our sponsors for all the support, and everyone else that supported us! This was a big step and an achievement for Team TIME and hope it will continue to grow!!