I loved the bike course, twisty, technical, 3 steep climbs, lots of fast downs, I have to describe it simply as... brutal! There was bags of pre race discussions as to what bike to use, TT or 'roadie'. I planned TT right from the start. The Trek, for me, handles just as well as a road bike going up as well as going down, it's just faster so it was a no brainer. I was chuffed with the fastest bike split of the day too, so that sort of backed up my choice.
The run, although described by the organisers as 'flat' wasn't, (to locals who wander around mountains maybe) but to us it was a challenge at the end of the swim and that brutal bike and the long, long transitions. Stunning again - though round the lake.
Schedule:
Like most International events. They have a schedule over 3-4 days. Briefings were on the Thursday, my race was on the Friday, then various elites, para-triathletes and other distances were over the Saturday and Sunday.
Race Day:
Every day leading up to race day was beautiful sunshine... You know; 'holiday weather'! But the evening before the race it rained all night. So in the morning, it was damp on roads, not good for the steep, twisty descents but oh well, everyone is racing in the same conditions!
I grabbed a lift with Dan Busbridge, an U20 GB team mate of mine, in the morning... So arrived nice and early! I know! EARLY! The time before the race flew by and before I knew it, I was suiting up making sure it was fitted perfectly, then was called over to the starting pens with 10 mins till race start.
9th place was around 10 seconds ahead of me coming out the water, but I made that up in T1! We were running out onto the bike as a 'pack' (still running at the point, so not drafting!!) I did my flying mount and overtook the 'pack' and set on a mission to hunt down first place and take top spot! My mission was complete after the first 5k of the bike! Sweeeet! Now just needed to put as much time as I could between me and second place! I did just that! I had 38 seconds lead coming into T2 and put another 7 seconds into him in T2...
2nd and 3rd had a tight race and I surely congratulated them, being a good sportsman ;)
Well done to all the GB athletes that crossed the line especially the 16-19 AG... Was great to see so many of us out there representing the country! Great achievements all round!
Junior Elite Race Analysis:
The next day I watched the Junior elites... I had been looking forward to this one! Main reason being to see how far off I am.
Swim - It's a bit cheeky because I actually saw a boat out in the middle of the lake removing a bouy and moving the rest of them closer! Maybe to make the swim more accurate? Because to be fair, the times were a bit slow on the day of our race, everyone was a good 40 seconds to 1 minute down on what they know they can do, so there must have been something wrong, and one can only assume the organisers picked up on this too! Even with the course being slightly shorter, the elites are rapid, like... crazy quick!
Bike - Their bike course was different to ours... Ours was 20k, with 720m of climbing, theirs' was 20k with just 267m of gentle climbing made up of 3 laps, such a shame considering the great challenging roads in this area. Their times were... hmm... Respectably average.
GB elite Alex West came off the bike in the lead group with Luke Penny in the chasing group, only under a minute behind! Good goin' that!
Run - Again, their run consisted of 5k, same distance as ours, but half the amount of ascending as us AGers. 4 of the juniors broke off the front, including winner Raphael Montoya (France) who smashed the run with an amazing time of 15.20! Wow! However, I was surprised to see that after 20th place, they all ran over 17 minutes! I half expected at least 50% of the field go sub 16.30 if I'm honest! But oh well... Just makes it a bit more promising for me when I get there! ;)
It is such a shame that we never get the chance to compare like with like, some folk simply look at the end times and dismiss the achievements of the age group athletes. For example
'Grouper' - (as we are referred to) Kitzbuhel sprint 1:05:12
Elite- Kitzbuhel sprint 57: 26
So looking at that the best grouper is still 8 minutes behind the Elite, but as I say it doesn't take into account:
• Measured swim course
• Completely different bike routes
• Flatter run course for the elites
• Drafting in the elite race
• Groupers transition much further from the swim- there's 2 1/2 mins just there!
I had a text from an elite basically saying well done on my win but I was still 10 minutes off the pace, bugged me a bit that if someone 'inside' the elites doesn't see the difference in the race conditions and just looks at the end times, is it the same with their 'talent' spotters?
...
In conclusion... Awesome venue, great to have wider European participation, was a wicked vibe and I could sit here a list how good it was! Especially to go out the next night and catch Richard Vagar and Alistair Brownlee sneaking a few (a lot) of jeagar bombs, summer shots and a whole lot more, trust me, a whole lot more! And what I took from that is; if they can, why can't I? ;)
Also, coming 1st Brit, I have Pre-qualified for next years Euro Champs in Geneva, although I have other plans for this race! If Geneva is half as good as Kitzbuhel it's going to be awesome!
Great event and hosts.
Quick 'highlights' video of the AG sprint race, how many times can you sport me!?