2014 Townsville Subaru/Trek Olympic Distance

Every time I told people I was heading over to Townsville for an Olympic Distance race, the first question I always got was, why? Why go all that way for such a short race?

A couple of reasons really, but the main one is that it is about the only race on in Australia at the time. Being winter, and the off season for most of Australia, there just aren’t many races on in the middle of the year. If you want to race in Winter, you have to go somewhere warm.

As to why I wanted a race in Winter, that is a separate issue. Basically, due to injury, my racing for the first half of 2014 was fairly sporadic. I had a forgettable experience in Geelong 70.3 and had to withdraw from Melbourne Ironman. My list of solid races for the first six months of 2014 is made up of Albany Half and Busselton 70.3. A bit light on. Daryl and I both decided that I needed more race time before heading into the second half of 2014. But what, there just isn’t anything on?

Answer, Townsville Subaru/Trek Olympic Distance.

So that is the why. Now for the What?

Townsville Olympic is part of a larger Townsville Tri Festival. There are a whole bunch of races on over the course of the weekend, the Olympic, a Sprint, an Enticer and even a flying mile running race on the day before. In 2014 the Townsville Olympic was also part of the selection series for the Australia Age Group Olympic Distance Team. It is a small race, but as a result of the qualifying points, people turned up from all over the place. Even one or two keen ones from Perth…

All the races are held around the foreshore of Townsville. The course for the Olympic looks like this:




By way of a description, the course is a lovely one.

As you can see from the map, the swim is a point to point. I was in Townsville for three days, and on each of those days the water was beautiful and flat. I gather Townsville can get windy, but on the days I was there I didn’t see it (except in the afternoons). Not much swell either, so all up the swim is a pleasant one. There are a couple of things to be aware of with the swim though. Firstly, there were only 4 buoys to mark the course. In my opinion (and a few people I chatted to) the sight lines were just a bit long. Navigation is easy, since you are just following the coast. But a few more buoys (another four I think) would just make it a bit easier.  Add to that, the finish of the swim is just a bit confusing. Both the Olympic Distance and the Sprint Distance tris use similar swim courses (the Sprint being shorter obviously) but with different coloured buoys. By the time you get to the finish of the swim, you have pink buoys (Olympic) and yellow buoys (Sprint), plus a couple of big buoys to mark the finish chute, all in close proximity to each other. On top of that, you swim past the finish chute to the last pink buoy, turn and then swim back to the finish. So you are just starting to wonder whether you missed the turn, when you see the final pink buoy. As I said, just a bit confusing. Not difficult though, just probably a good idea to make sure you familiar with what you are going to see before race day.

A couple of other things with the swim, given it is in Townsville, people have this image that the water will be this beautiful crystal clear blue. It isn’t. It isn’t unpleasant, but visibility in the water isn’t great. It is not really an issue, and is fairly standard for tropical Australia, but it is something to be aware of. Also, I suspect the swim is a little long. I don’t have anything to back that up, but my feeling is that it is a couple of hundred metres long, I overheard somebody say their Garmin measured it at 1800m, but there may also have been some poor navigation playing a part there. The swim times were certainly all on the slow side. The final things is that this race was wetsuit legal. Triathlon Australia gave the race an exemption so that wetsuits could be used in water temperatures up to 26 degrees. This was done as protection against jellyfish, however, as I mention a bit later, the water isn't exactly warm and so I suspect the water temp probably fell into the optional wetsuit temperature range anyway.

While there were  a couple of issues with the swim, there no problems with the bike. Wonderful course. Quite flat (82m of elevation gain over 40km), good surfaces for much of it, light winds. Super quick. The course starts in the foreshore area of Townsville before heading out towards Pallarendra Point. The section along the foreshore in town is full of round abouts and speed bumps. I mean full, if you aren’t going around a round about you are going over a speed bump. It sounds horrible, but in the end it doesn’t slow you down much and was actually kind of fun. The course is closed so you can hit the round abouts without really slowing down and the speed bumps are gentle enough that you can do the same with them. However, the section out to Pallarendara Point and back is where you will find most of your speed. That section was heaps of fun. No aid stations on the ride by the way.

Whilst the course is great, the only thing I will say is that on the way out to Pallarendra Point and back, they divide the road into three lanes by using witches hats. One lane heading out of town, one heading back. The third lane is for cars. They do this so that they can keep the road open. The whole things works well for most of it, but there were a couple of sections where the bike lanes pretty narrow. It just meant keeping your wits about you when overtaking, and being a bit mindful in places. It didn’t cause me any issues, but there were a couple of areas where it could have, particularly if you have a couple of people toddling along side by side.

Lastly the run. Once again quite pleasant. Nearly all along the coast and a fairly straight forward affair. 4 aid stations per lap, which was heaps. The only tricky bit with the run course is you run up a long hill through Jazzine Barracks on the way back into town (not on the way out). Not that steep, but it is on the long side, and could be a bit of a surprise if you weren’t expecting it. It is a kind of tucked away (you can really only get to it on foot) but it is worth making the effort to see it before race day. As with the bike, you also spend time on some narrow paths. Not much the organisers can do about that without changing the course, and it doesn’t cause many issues. However, occasionally the narrow paths mean that overtaking has to be done on the grass. There is enough room for two people abreast, ie one running in each direction, but definitely not three, ie a person overtaking. Once the course was congested on the second lap it required a bit of care to make sure you didn’t run into somebody.  As with the swim, the run was also a little long, somewhere between 10.3km and 10.5km seemed to be the opinion. Other than that, no real issues of concern.

Finally, a couple of words about Townsville. I had never been there before, so wasn’t sure what to expect. But I was very pleasantly surprised; the town had a really nice feel, similar to Darwin. As I have said the race is mostly along the foreshore, which is a very popular public open space, so there were great crowds, which in turn gave the race a really good vibe. The biggest difference to Darwin I found, and which was a real surprise, was the temperature. I can honestly say I was cold on several occasions, if I was to go back I would probably take a jumper. At the beginning of race morning it was sub 10 degrees (my Garmin measured it as 8 degrees at the start of the bike – but I am not sure that is correct). It certainly wasn’t hot, which is one thing I think a lot of people are concerned about. The swim was actually on the nippy side (my guess would be low 20s), and I wouldn’t have been keen to do it without a wetsuit.  For most of the race though, it worked out to be about the perfect temperature for racing. Lovely.

So how did my day go? Well in the end, much better than expected to be honest.

My lead up to this race was not ideal. It had been going very well, but then about three weeks ago I strained a facet joint on the left side of my back and seem to have done some soft tissue damage to my glute. The injury caused me a fair bit of pain, and meant I was unable to run leading up to the race. As recently as the Tuesday before the race I tried to have a run session, but was forced to abort it after my hip became too sore. On that Tuesday I had a couple of frantic conversations with Daryl about whether it was even worth making the trip. Not great.

Daryl reassured me that there was still a lot to be gained by doing the race, and so I headed over. But even at the 5km mark of the run leg I was still unsure whether I would make it to the 10th km.

Going in with that sort of cloud over my head, made for a bit of a mental battle. In the end I was forced to just roll the dice and see how my hip would react to the race. I shifted my focus to making sure the process behind the race was a good one and to hammering the bike leg. Finding the motivation to race hard, when you were unsure whether you would even be able to finish, was a bit of a struggle though.

Putting all that out of my head though, I lined up under the starting arch at about 7:00am ready to hit the water and get on with it. Despite the small field, the organisers had gone with wave starts, each 3 minutes apart, which meant that I was under the arch with about 30 other people from the 35-39 year old age group. When the time came, the horn went and we all charged down the beach into the water. I dived in, lost my goggles, cursed myself a bit, put my goggles back on and got on with it. I had a bit of water in one of my goggles, which really annoys me, but a couple of guys from my wave were making a charging start and so I didn’t dare lose the time it would take to empty the water out. Despite the irritation I told myself that it was an Olympic and so I was going to have to put up with the water, because I wasn’t stopping. With the two people in front starting fast I forced myself up a gear and chased their toes. At the first turning buoy one of the two guys slowed his pace right down and so I jumped on the toes of the other. He was moving pretty quick and so I wasn’t able to hold him, however, he didn’t move away quickly and I was able to keep him in sight.

From that point the swim went pretty smoothly. I realised quickly that I was struggling with the sighting and so I used a mixture of following the guy in front and sighting the buoys when they were close enough. As we progressed through the swim we started moving through the waves in front (we were one of the last waves) and so I lost sight of the guy I had been following. By that stage there were plenty of feet to follow, so navigation wasn’t a big issue. Without somebody to chase I just focused on maintaining the work and getting to the finish line. After a bit of confusion around the swim finish, as I mentioned above, I finally made my way to the beach and up the sand into transition. My swim time was 21min 57 seconds; I was second out of the water from my wave, and the 5th fastest overall.

In transition, I headed down the wrong set of bike racks (again!!!). This is despite walking it several times the day before and the morning of the race. My excuse is that the racks weren’t very well marked. But that isn’t much of an excuse. In the end I knew what to look for and I missed it. Luckily I stopped pretty much next to my bike, but on the wrong side of the rail. Rather than have to go all the way back down the end of the rack, I was able to just duck under the rail and be next to my bike. In the end I don’t think it really cost me much time, but it very easily could have. Stupid mistake.

Once I was at the bike, it was wetsuit off, sunnies and helmet on and out of there.

The beginning of the bike leg headed straight into the town section of the course, with the associated round abouts and speed bumps. For most of that section, the bike did not feel great. However, I was pretty sure it was just my legs warming up and so wasn’t too concerned. After about 8 to 10 minutes I was out of town and on the way out to Pallarendara Point for the first time and it all started to feel good. From that point on the ride didn’t really stop feeling good. On the way out of town the speed was coming easily, but I reminded myself that there was probably a tail wind. I was watching both my power levels and my speed during the ride. However, part of the aim of this race was to try and validate the power/speeds I had been getting in training, so rather than have a power/speed target, I was just going for the best I could. So in the end I raced largely by feel.

The leg out of town really flew by, but then when I turned to head back I was surprised to see that the speed didn’t really drop. The wind was more of a cross-head, rather than a true head wind and it didn’t really seem to make much of a difference. Heading into the second leg I was still feeling good. Speed and power dropped a bit and so I focussed on keeping it consistent. When I turned to head back to town for the second time, I was worried that the slight headwind would hurt me, but once again it didn’t seem to. In fact at the 35km mark I was still feeling good and strong. I didn’t see any reason to conserve and so I pushed it to the line. I got to the end of the ride, whipped off the shoes, dismounted and ran into transition. My time for the bike was 57min 25 seconds, second fastest bike split for the day, which was particularly chuffed about.

Into transition again, and this time I had no trouble finding the right row and the right rack. Helmet off, hat on, shoes on and time to go. Crunch time I told myself, let’s find out what is about to happen. Heading out of transition, I was careful to follow the route through transitions that we had been instructed to use in the briefing. However, I was a bit annoyed to see that it wasn’t really being enforced, and so there was nothing stopping you taking the shortest possible route from your rack to the run start and that plenty of people were doing just that. Not a big thing, but I think it probably cost me a handful of seconds compared to others. A handful of seconds wouldn’t have made a difference to my race, but in an Olympic distance tri it can. Oh well.

Onto the run, and the plan was to just run hard, if the hip survived good, if not, then time to walk. After the first km or so, my pace was okay, down on what I would have expected a few weeks ago, but given the lead up, not that bad. I managed to hold that pace for the first 4km or so, not managing to settle and feel comfortable or good, but not significantly slowing down either. About the 4km mark I hit the hill that goes through Jazzine Barracks and so I had a slower km. After that I never really seemed to recover my pace. I wasn’t conscious of slowing down, but I was just running slower.  At the end of the first lap, a quick inventory of my body revealed that I was still feeling okay injury wise, and so hit the turn around and headed out for lap 2. Around the 6km mark, my back was feeling a little tender and I made a note to keep an eye on it. It didn’t get any worse, so I was happy to keep pushing on. As I worked through the second lap I was relieved to see that the pace didn’t really drop any further from where it had settled after the 4km mark and so I was able to maintain that pace to the finish line.  In the end the run time was 42min 19 seconds. Not exactly lightning, but good enough on the day.

All up, the effort was got me a time of 2:03:56. At first I was a bit disappointed by the time, but once I was able to see it in the context of the rest of the field I felt a bit better. All up the times were all on the slow side. Leading into the race the organisers were making a big deal about how quick the course is, and I think they are probably right, the individual legs are fast. However, as I have mentioned I think the run, and possibly the swim are a bit long, which in the end would help explain the slow times. Whatever the reason, after some thought, I was happy with the time. The time was good enough to get me the win in the 35-39 Age Group and also 5th overall. I am particularly happy with the 5th overall, since, whilst the field was a small one, it was also quite a strong one, and well, let’s be honest, Olympic Distance isn’t really my thing. There were some very solid athletes at Townsville and so I was happy to be able to claim 5th amongst them.

So what are my impressions of the race? All up, I had a ball. It was just a really fun race. Yes there were the little niggles that I have mentioned, but every race has them and they didn’t really detract. All the little things, an impressive expo, heaps of spectators and competitors across the various events, a fun course, tearing through the streets on your bike etc. The sum of the parts made for a great whole. They even had Pete Murray (the voice of Ironman) on the microphone. Every time he called somebody across the lines I was expecting to hear him say “Congratulations you are an Ironman” (he was saying Congratulations you are a legend instead in case you are interested). The comment I heard a couple of times was that it felt like a much bigger event. And I think that sums it up really well.

Would I go back? I would certainly consider it. As I have said, Olympic distance isn’t really my thing and it is a long way to go for two hours of racing, but it was a lot of fun. If I had a gap in my Calender and was looking for a race to fill it (or I was just sick of Winter) I would give it some thought.

A couple of quick thankyous at the end here. The race itself didn’t require the physical effort of a Half Ironman or an Ironman on my behalf, but in many ways the events in the weeks leading up to the race makes the contributions of others to this race even more significant than normal. A big thanks to Daryl, for nursing me through my injury and getting me to the start line, even when I was pretty panicked in the week leading up.  Steady wisdom and a quiet belief. It made all the difference. A big thanks to Shelley my wife, for saying “whatever you need” and then doing everything she could to make me happy and get me to the start line, even though doing so heaped hardship on her own plate, plus, you know, letting me train and race in the first place. A couple of extra little thanks:
  • first Lee-Anne Flugel, my physio that sticks me with needles and gets me back on my feet when the injuries happen;
  • the guys at Break Your Limits, for giving making me feel welcome, giving me some support and just being all round great folks;
  • Churchill Cycles, for helping me out with a back wheel when mine didn't show up in time.

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