3:30am Here we go! It is race day,
I jump out of bed with excitement and tight schedule of last min mobility and getting in an early breakfast and coffee to allow time for digestion pre-race.
Pre-Race Breakfast
This is something I often get asked about as a fat adapted athlete and it is something that I am always playing around with but I think I found a winner!! I selected a smoothie, why? Easy on the digestive system allowing quick absorption and easy to consume on the move. Especially helpful for those who struggle to eat due to pre race nerves, never had this problem personally, I often eat too much…
The most exciting thing about this smoothie is I get to include carbs I selected one of my old favorites a banana!! As a fat adapted athlete, this often confuses a lot of people, why would I limit my carbs majority of the time and then around a race have them? My goal is metabolic flexibility, the ability to utilise multiple fuel substrates efficiently to their optimal capacity. Compared with most athletes who rely on carbohydrate alone. By doing this it is offering me a competitive edge. What else is in this super smoothie, as most you know I love the little bio-hacks for optimising performance. I still kept the base of smoothie high fat just threw in some extra carbs to buffer my stores. Did I mention it was ridiculously tasty, most likely due to the Pruvit ketones and banana not the BCAA’s hahaha
Ingredients
- Coconut Cream
- Macadamia Nuts
- Mixed Berries
- Spinach
- Banana
- Pruvit Max Exogenous Ketones Swiss
- Bulletproof MCT Oil
- BCAA’s
- Creatine
- Beta-Alanine
Of course alongside this smoothie I had coffee or should I say my rocket fuel, after my coffee detox for the last 2 weeks. After this perfect combo I was feeling amazing. As you can see in the picture, race morning is all about multitasking, with my Myo-Volt (NZ based company!) strapped to those pre-race niggles that like to arise last minute. This wearable vibration device is awesome for passively freeing and warming up the last minute niggles while getting prepared so that your body is race ready. I moved mine around my body and wore all morning and it right up to the last min at the startline.
Race
Into the bullpen where they lead us into swim, the excitement begins to build as I chat with my friends within my race. Maybe a little to casual as I continued a academic debate referencing literature back and forth with another athlete who is a food technologist…
Swim:
Into the water and as always it hit me, it is time! As we lined up at the boye pushing for position i began to control stimulation with my 4-7-8sec breath technique as I find it to over stimulated I lose my breath in the chaos of a swim start. BANG!! Splashing, arms and legs everywhere! In a poor position I had it from all angles. Up to and past the first boye would of had to been one of the most intense swim starts I have ever been in. With brutal kicks to the head and punches to the body, and people pulling me back. Thankfully, after the second boye it was a straight swim for the remaining 1300m ish and I was able to break away from the main pack and lead the chase group and instead of being surrounded by athletes I had clear water so no one to draft sadly. Instead doing my best to hold the tails of Malcolm’s group (race leader).
I don’t know if it was the lack of turns or what but the swim seemed to be never ending. Into transition, I managed to hold my position as chase leader, putting me right where I expected to be when it hit me the sudden realisation that I had forgotten my race belt and number. I had left it at the swim start in my race bag…. pretty certain I would be disqualified if I didn’t organise it by the run. Into transition this played on my mind and in the sea of bikes I ran past and had to double back to my bike.
Lucky I didn’t need it for the bike so with minimal hope I tried my best to recite the quickest explanation to tell friends on course supporting “forgot race belt! 239 swim bag”. Lucky I spotted Jai Davies-campbell on my way out of transition and he did his best to save the day but had no luck but sadly the official looking after bags would not pass my bag over to him but hey worth a shot right!
Photo: Juliet King
Bike:
With the thought of disqualification and the possibility I may not be allowed to finish the race, it began to really play with my head. I had to remind myself multiple times there is nothing I can do about it I just had to focus on my race and do the best I can.
On the bike with my power meter not working I was feeling extremely heavy unsure what I was pushing. It wasn’t until the first turn around. where my legs began to open up, I began to feel much better by the second lap. Sadly though just as I really began to find my groove the 40 km was up and it was time to jump off the bike and onto the run.
Photo: Juliet King
Run:
The moment of truth would they let me run without a race number???
They quickly spotted I was missing a race number as I tried to dodge and quickly race past them, they sent me back to my bike where I pretended to search for it (i knew it was not there…) I then went back to the official and begged to let me finish the race, she said ok but she was pretty certain I would be disqualified. Stoked! at least I can finish the race, not ideal but I will take it. Although World Champs this was not my peak event, my focus this year is longer distance triathlons so I was not here for a placing or anything I just wanted to race and have a good time. Luckily I was allowed to do that.
Photo: Juliet King
The run as always my weakest leg of the race was a bit of a struggle but I just kept it consistent, finishing with a sprint, to wrap up another World Champs and even though disqualified I managed to score myself a medal so with a time and medal I got everything I came here for, the time may not count but that doesn’t bother me.
Beach Time: Unplug & Unwind
Hiring a car was defiantly the best move, freeing us up to roam the coastline with ease and pack all our toys in the car, making my life a lot easier carting around everything so I had endless options; bike, surf, swim, run, recover…. Sunsets in Burleigh heads, camping in Byron Bay, surfing at Lenox Heads and a lot training mixed in, travelling up and down the coastline
