Richard Thompson Yeppoon Aug 2011
Posted on by Gary Land
The hooter sounded and we were met with a metre swell that stayed with us for the entire swim. Despite a good start, I never really felt all that comfortable and hit T1 in 24:22, a bit over 90 seconds off the lead.
I jumped on the bike and started the 5 lap bike course, notorious for its granular surface and false flats. I instantly felt great on the bike and within 10km had pick up Matty White and moved into fifth spot. The technical officials were kept busy all day as the 12 metre draft zone seemed to make little difference to the actual distance between riders. By the 45km mark, the watts were still high and I passed good friend Ollie Whistler and we moved into first and second place respectively. Due to my lack of running leading into the event, I knew that the only way to hold onto first or second was to put in as much time into Matty as possible. I put my head down into the headwind and continued to push the pace until T2.
After 2:11 of riding the Pinarello, I jumped off the bike with Ollie and we lead the run out with a lead of 2.30 mins in front of third place. By 4km I knew that I didn’t have the legs to contest for the win so I was doing my best to hang on for second. Into the second lap, I was 40sec from the lead and 1:30 from third place. I was struggling and the lack of running was coming to the fore. At the 17km mark I was overtaken without much resistance. I very happy to cross the finish line in third in 3:58, a bit over 90 seconds off the win.
Everything considered, I am stoked for reaching the podium today. Massive congratulations to Ollie for holding Matty off by a mere 6 seconds to take the win!
Thanks must go to my coach, Kristian Manietta from Tri Specific, Skinfit, SGTi Racing, all my other sponsors and especially my lovely wife Lisa (the best looking volunteer this weekend!). I am looking forward to getting stuck into some decent run training over the next month in readiness for Ironman 70.3 Japan.
Cheers
RT
www.richardthompson.com.au www.facebook.com/richardthompson85
