2 Days Before Race Day – (Friday)

So, here I am sitting in my hotel – The Seebichl Hotel – which is in a perfect location, at the top of the hill which is on the bike course, thank you sis for finding such a great hotel and location. Today, I have been around the swim and the bike course. Swimming in the Schwarzsee lake, the water temp was around 20.2, I was in my wetsuit but it felt very warm however, that wasn’t to last, as later on in the day at around 3pm the rain came down, and as timing would have it, if it rains at this time on Sunday it’ll be as we’re on the bike. Great!

Going around the bike course today we had a police escort for the whole two laps and I have to say that it is the best bike course I have done this year. It’s not just your bog standard flat loop, there is a hill just out of transition and technical section through the town on both the roads and cobble stones, which I’m sure will make the race interesting on the bike.

This afternoon I’ve just been chilling, watched American Gangster – good film – with Carrie and then watched some of the younger Austrian triathlons doing their mini-triathlon whilst sipping a coffee. Watching the younger ones cycling up and down the hill from my hotel did make me smile. They looked so cute, on what looked to be huge bikes, with their helmets falling off their heads, covering their eyes reminded me of my first triathlon… but we won’t go there.

Day Before Race Day (Saturday)

Went for a little run this morning down by the course and my legs didn’t feel as good as yesterday, but felt okay on the stride, so was happy and then had a lovely breakfast at our hotel with mum, dad and Carrie. The eggs are lovely here, some say I’m easily pleased but the yokes of the egg are bright orange, so that’s how I now they are nice and fresh. So I tucked in to my breakfast, and then went for a swim at the race hotel’s pool with Clarke Ellis from NZ, Stuart and Will which was pretty picture perfect to be honest. They have got a 48m swimming pool on the 7th (top) floor, with all glass windows surrounding it so you can swim and look at the amazing views of the mountains, it’s pretty amazing.

Now I am just relaxing before I take a spin down to the start, to take a look at the in’s and out’s of transition and then I will sit outside my hotel for a bit and watch the men’s bike as they come up the hill. The sun seems to be trying to break through slightly between the clouds, so I am hoping it will stay the same for our race to be honest as it will make the bike a lot safer, I’ve had too many crashes in the rain from inexperienced rider’s thanks. I’m not too bothered if it’s a wetsuit swim or not to be honest, but I would just like it to be dry, either way, I’m sure this will be a great race.

So, I’m just finishing watching the men’s run on my laptop and OH MY GOD MR STUART HAYES YOUR ARE A TRUE LEGEND! The guy who has just won the Kitzbuhel World Championship Series Race is my training partner and I am so proud of him. He has just proven, that even if some people don’t want to help you achieve your dreams, there are always people around that will, and with Team Dillon we have a supporting group around us that are the best and I am so pleased for Stu, he totally deserves his win today! BIG CONGRATULATIONS!

Now, let’s see how I go tomorrow.

Race day in Kitzbuhel

I have defiantly been experiencing the rollercoaster ride of racing recently, with the bad race of London Hyde Park to the second in the London Triathlon to the thing I hate the most, the DNF in Kitzbuhel. So, here’s the (short) story…

I was number 32, which didn’t give me a great start on the pontoon, but I know I was swimming okay so I wasn’t too concerned. I dived in and got battered a bit to the first buoy (again), and found myself just of the first pack at the 750m turn around point just behind Nicola Spirig and Barbara Riveros, but I could see the front pack as I dived in so dug in hard, and managed to bridge the small gap onto the back of the front pack which is a much nicer place to be. Then I sprinted up and down the ramp into T1 had a smooth transition, out in the lead pack with quite a big pack of about 22 girls. The bike wasn’t the hardest of paces, but the undulating bike course made it challenging. I felt good up the hills and found myself naturally going to the front but then on the decent through the tunnel Helen Jenkins would lay the pace down, so it was a matter of hanging onto her wheel, which I can tell you was not easy.

On lap five of six, the worst luck started and my back wheel punctured but there was still hope, with me not being too far from the wheel stop I a changed my back wheel and started again, but I was a minute plus down from the front group who were moving. The Nicola Spirig train was coming up behind me, so I jumped on but could tell I was losing time, and the adrenaline from stopping, changing my wheel and starting again, my legs were hurting, but with one lap to go, with the gap to the leaders being around 1 minute 30 seconds, I was in the mind set of “Okay, I can still run some girls down, lets GO!”. THEN I soon realised that lady luck was not on my side, with yet again, the wheel I had just changed puncturing again! It obviously wasn’t meant for me today. I was too far away from the transition area were the wheel stop was. DAY DONE!

I rimed it back to T2 and watched group by group go by, pi**ed off does not put it into words enough. I saw Dad, Carrie, Michelle and Stuart, handed them my stuff, grabbed my running trainers and went for a run.

The highs and lows of triathlon, oh well, onwards and upwards, next up for me is the Lausanne World Sprint Championship Race next weekend (Saturday).

Thanks for tuning in xxx

Well, I haven’t done a blog for a few months and a lot has happened. Drentse 8 back in April was followed by Drenthe World Cup, where I placed 36th – a result that I was pleased with. Various other bits of racing followed including a four-day stage race in Czech, Gracia Orlova.

It was after we got back from this race when my season took a disappointing turn. We had a couple of easy days to allow the legs to recover after racing, then on the morning of Friday 7th May we set out on a normal training ride of three hours when our group was involved in an accident with a car. Basically, to cut the long story short, the car hit me directly and the outcome was a broken femur and wrist. Obviously I was absolutely gutted, but three months on it’s time to get over it and now I’m back on the bike!

The past three months have been quite difficult, both mentally and physically but I’ve come a long way in terms of getting flexibility back in the leg. The broken wrist didn’t prove too much of a problem – I was in a cast for four weeks so struggled as it was my left leg and right wrist – but it’s been a longer job with the leg.

There was a lot of muscle damage in my upper leg, probably best shown in the first two weeks after the accident when my leg was absolutely huge! Plus I struggled for a while with quads lag – basically I couldn’t contract my quadricep properly.

That took a long time to get right again, and quite a few painful hours of work with a Compex machine (a horrible device that sends electrical impulses to the muscle to help it contract, but feels like you’re being continually stabbed with needles) I struggled with walking too and only just got rid of my crutches completely a month ago.

But now I can get back on the bike and begin the journey back to fitness again. I’ve started off slowly, doing 8.5 hours last week and 11 this week. It does feel like I’m completely starting from scratch again, but I’m hoping that once I’ve done a few more weeks at least I’ll feel like more of an athlete again.

I got passed by a guy in trainers and riding an ancient mountain bike on Monday… not a proud moment especially as I was in the usual GB kit! Training has been based around work on the turbo and rollers, riding my road bike on the treadmill and road rides. The latter was a big step for me, there’s the old saying ‘if you fall off a horse get back on’ but obviously for me there was a three month gap between having the accident and getting back on the road so it was pretty scary at first.

I’m getting better though and I’m just trying to get on with it because obviously I recognise the need to have that confidence back if I’m to get on with my training. I’m in the process now too of looking for car sponsorship, as being able to drive out of Fallowfield in Manchester where I’m now based, to quieter roads around Wilmslow and the Peak District will be a lot better and hopefully, much safer.

It’s strange being back in Manchester as opposed to Belgium as the other Academy girls are still based out there. I’ve been keeping in contact with them and both Katie and Lucy have had great results recently.

I just wish I could be racing too. I’m not sure when my next race will be, the National Track Champs, U23 Europeans and Commonwealth Games are definitely out – a huge disappointment – but maybe the World Cup season in the winter will provide an opportunity to race again.

Anyway, I will keep my blog more up to date now I’m back in the saddle. And thanks to everyone who has supported me since the accident… it’s definitely helped me to keep my chin up.

Well I have finally started training again. It’s a great relief as I start to get myself in to shape for the forthcoming season and actually feel like I am doing something constructive. My hip is still far from perfect as I train cautiously around it (slightly paranoid not to put back my rehab).

I still have a long way to go, further than I would like but it’s strangely nice to feel the burn of the gym again. But it’s going to take more hard work to get the movement back to where I was before. Thankfully I have done it now at the start of my campaign which gives me plenty of time to build things up again.

Although being injured I have not sat idle, making the most of my time out of the gym and off the slopes, searching for the funding for a four year program that will take me to Sochi and hopefully the podium.

I have been working on sorting out my seating issue finding a seating specialist eager to help. With the Combined Services Disabled Ski Team we have been looking at the suspension units of the sit skis making sure that we have them set up right.

I can now turn my focus on my next challenge; a 70 mile bike ride in September raising money for the Disability Snowsport UK and the team and helping my get fit for the season.

I don’t know if I’m quite ready yet but I am looking forward to the challenge from Ben Nevis to the Cairngorms and it will give me certainly give me something to aim for over the next month I just hope it doesn’t take me a month to recover.

If you would like to help please sponsor me at www.justgiving.com/bdstpeak2peak.

Unfortunately the last month escalated from the annoying visits to hospitals for scans, throughout the first half of the season, to admission to hospital on three separate occasions. Being discharged twice, only to be readmitted via ambulances both times is not a very pleasant experience.

It’s especially unpleasant when the reasons for heading back each time were violent vomiting and something that I hesitate to call a headache. My opinion now is that one has never experienced a headache until you have experienced the pain I had to endure.

When I was conscious enough to spend some time on my i-phone, I was able to Google ‘headaches caused by a spinal tap’ (leakage). I found many forums prompted by expectant mothers-to-be and new mothers. One contributor even commented that the headaches ‘were far worse than child-birth itself.’

So there you have it, a comparable point of pain for males and females alike. I would not recommend sampling the procedure voluntarily though. Plus, what I went through wasn’t preceded by nine months with the pleasure that instigates child-birth.

So what happened? I had a successful epidural injection in order to kill pain and allow me to bowl at the end of May. It then wore off by mid-June, so I organised another to get me through to the end of the season. Although not ideal, this had to be the case if I wanted to get re-signed for next season.

However, it went wrong. In layman’s terms the needle went too far into the back and punctured my spinal column. This causes the fluid that supports the brain and regulates pressure in the spinal column to leak.

The consequences of this type of error are a number of weeks laid on your back with horror headaches whenever you stand up. Of course the obvious answer would be to not stand up, however, have you ever tried being violently sick whilst lying down?

It does give you the opportunity to learn new skills though; such as ‘weeing’ into an ergonomically designed bottle and getting away with washing only ones ’smelly bits’ (whilst also horizontal) for a number of days.

The consequences of what has happened over the last month have meant that it looks unlikely that I will be able to play any significant cricket this season. The 2nd eleven season finishes in about three weeks and the county season finishes mid-September. It finishes off what has been an incredibly frustrating year and one that may well see me deemed surplus to requirements at Northants.

My next steps are to see if any other counties may be interested as I don’t foresee this injury being one that will cause me grief in the future and therefore I feel I have plenty more to give to the county game.

Failing that I will endeavour to pursue another career and try to ignite some of the irons I’ve had in the fire over the last few years… I feel there is plenty more to write on this subject and the consequential issues arising from it; so watch out for further blogs which may or may not satisfy your unquestionable thirst for all they entail…

So, I was on a bit of a downer after London Hyde Park, as I really wanted to have a good race on the modified Olympic course, and starting off with a bad swim was only the beginning of a hard day at the office. Lessons were learnt during the race and I went into the following week ready for some tough, hard core, balls in the wheelie bin sessions with Michelle and Stuart.

Stuart had a fantastic race at Hyde Park, which to be honest has been long overdue, he is the most hard working triathlete I know, and to have him alongside me to train with is a privilege. Stuart is like a big brother, rolled into a training partner, rolled into a teacher, who I am always learning off and for him to have a good race at Hyde Park on home turf really did make up for my shocker of a weekend.

So from one end of London to another for the Challenger London Triathlon at the ExCel centre. I had done some decent times in training, which I think I needed to get my confidence back, so I was ready to race. Kirsty (a good mate) came around and braided my hair for me on Friday evening which got me into race mode, and then I travelled up to London on Saturday ready for the race on Sunday.

The weather hadn’t been what I was hoping for in the lead up to London, and it looked like it was going to be a wetsuit swim, which I wasn’t looking forward to if I’m honest, as I hadn’t used it at all this year. Anyway, race morning came and the sun was shining. I was stood around with the other elite women, waiting for the juniors to start their race and I couldn’t wait to get in the water to cool down – it gets pretty hot in that wetsuit when the sun is beaming down – bit of a change in climate from the day before when it was raining, but that’s good old British weather for you.

I was next to the best in the water, Helen Jenkins, Liz Blatchford, Vicky Holland and Kerry Lang – as you can see, not a bad GB women’s field. The horn sounded, the rope lifted and we were off, the women stayed in a line for a few 100m but then Helen found clear water and went off to the front on her own, and I swam the first 700m next to Liz, just behind Abbie Thorrington and a few other women.

Around the top buoy and on our way back, I tried to move around Abbie but ended up swimming next to her for the rest of the swim. I exited the water with her, about 15 seconds behind Helen and Liz.

I got into T1 and had a smooth transition and jumped straight on the bike where I was in time trial mode to try and catch Liz and Helen. This would have been easier if my legs were there with me on the bike but I think I left them back in transition. I could see Liz on her own out in front but not Helen, I managed to catch Liz but then the chasing pack which contained Kerry, Vicky and about four other women caught me, and then the chase was on to get Helen.

The group didn’t work great but we managed to catch Helen at the first turn around point but no sooner as we had completed that task, everyone seemed to sit up and were concentrating on taking in the sights of London – very frustrating. It then became pretty obvious it was going to be a running race, and I was hoping my legs would be waiting in transition where I left them.

Leading up to the London Triathlon, one of my aims was to get out of T2 with Helen, she is the top GB women at the moment, and I wanted to see where I was running wise against her, as she is not only GB number, but one of the best and most consistent in the world. I don’t think this race it was meant to be, I didn’t feel my normal self going out of T2, but I gave it a blast and lead for the first lap of four. I was hoping to get into my running stride, but if you’re not on top form, and trying to run with Helen, you’re in for a tough day at the office, and going out onto the second lap, Helen showed why she is one of the best in the world and started to get away from me. I finished second behind Helen, with Liz Blatchford finished third.

I’m pleased with how I raced, and am looking forward to the next few weeks where I am racing Kitzbuhel WCR then Lausanne World Sprint Champs.

It’s been a good weekend, with a smile back on my face; I’ve got to say Happy Birthday to my big sis Carrie who was 23 on Saturday, and my best friend Claire Hipkiss who was 21 on Monday.

Love ya all xxx

We had a great month in Krynica pinpointing our weaknesses from last season and really getting some great work done. It drew to a close as fast as it started and we ended our Polish squad camp in the mountains very pleased with ourselves. A busy schedule lay ahead, straight after a long days training we set off for home around 5pm only to arrive in Torun at 3am.

Needless to say I was very tired the next day, but it had to be done because our flight left Gdansk (which is another two hour drive) at 6am. All because our flight was cancelled a month before we flew, cheers!

We booked a hotel near the airport so we could get a few hours sleep. As we entered into Gdansk we were stopped in traffic, I put my hand break on, checked my mirror and oh no. I saw a white van speed round the corner and I could tell by his speed he was going to hit me. His brakes let out a loud screech, then tried to swerve but clipped my left side and just heard a mighty crash.

I pulled up to a lay-by and got out to check the damage. Not too bad. I had to pull the bumper out of my back left tyre and a few dents but overall it was ok. The other guy’s was mashed up a lot worse than mine but he cooperated fine. I thought ‘you idiot’ as he had his wife in the front and two children in the back in car-seats, you would think he would take it a little easier. Although annoying, luckily no one was hurt and my car at least was drivable, we exchanged our details and although a little dazed headed to our destination.

The hotel ended up being quite a trek away as we had to drive for about five minutes on a dirt track to find the place. It had a very lonely look to it and was quite under the weather with nobody around for miles. After seeing too many horror movies start this way we were a little on edge but made our way up to reception as we were both falling asleep already.

When we reached the front desk we were surprised to see smiling pleasant owners who upgraded our room for free and were very friendly. I felt very bad for expecting only bad things of their pride and joy but it just goes to show you can never judge a book by its cover.

A bit stressful and sleep deprived, but at least we returned safely just needing a bit more beauty sleep. Yet there was no time for catching up as I got back to Stacey’s just in time to be picked up by Shaun (Stacey’s brother) to go for my suit fitting. Before I knew it I was on a bus to Newcastle for Shaun’s stag do, but as juicy as it was you know I can’t say anything about the trip. The first law of the stag – sorry. What I can tell you is I had a great time and survived with only a few minor paintball bruises to the side, back, chest and legs.

On the Thursday of that week we managed to fit in a full days filming for a promotional advert at Ice Sheffield. A great day out and we really look forward to seeing the results from Rogue Frame Productions. Then to top it all off we had a fantastic weekend at Shaun’s wedding. Congratulations to them and I wish them many years of good fortune. It was a fantastic day and great to see all the families together. It pushed me and Stacey to get a few ideas together and think about the mammoth task of organising a wedding.

Anyway we are back in Poland now and had a week’s training back at base, just to see more great results. Let’s just hope the rest of our season can continue this way.

All the very best and speak soon.

In my experience, triathletes are a pretty crazy lot and paratriathletes are apparently no different.

Putting yourself through a gruelling trio of lake swimming, cycling and running takes a pretty special sort of character. Paratriathletes have missing limbs, paraplegia, visual impairments (the VI competitors have to run with blacked out goggles) and other physical disabilities.

The distances raced equal regular triathlons and a fascinating variety of prostheses, handcycles, racing wheelchairs and other equipment are used.

I took part in my first International Paratriathlon in Hyde Park last weekend in a GB trisuit! The super sprint (the shortest discipline: 400m swim in the Serpentine, 10km bike, 3.5km run) took me over 48 minutes to complete although I was pleased to get bronze behind European Champion, Jane Egan and to finish only 3 minutes and 7 seconds off gold.

Anna Turney’s 3rd place at the International Paratriathlon in Hyde Park

A little frustrated however that it took over three minutes to get out of my wetsuit and on to the bike. The fastest elite man, Hiffler, finished in 32mins 16secs for France and team GB won three gold, five silver and one bronze medal.

The paratriatletes are an inspirational, welcoming and encouraging lot, if a little insane. The paratriathlon aims to become a Paralympic Event in Rio in 2016 and if anyone deserves it they do.

So, it’s Saturday morning and I have just come back from a lovely run in Hyde Park. The course is up and running with Dextro Energy banners up, and all the marshals out. It gives me such a thrill.

The week’s preparation has been great. I got such a huge confidence boost from last weekend’s win. Knowing that I am swimming, cycling and running well going into a race is such a great feeling, but with this weekend’s field I knew it would be the toughest to date, but hey ho, that is what makes the race.

So, my journey to London started off with me driving down to Stuart’s parent’s house on Thursday morning, ready for the race briefing at 5pm. There was a GB team meeting and dinner at 6.45pm, after the race briefing but with me and Stuart not being able to afford another nights’ accommodation, it would have been silly not to just go back to his parent’s house and chill there.

Don’t get me wrong, I am so proud to be part of the GB team, and it fills me with pride to have GBR on my chest when I race, but I am not part of the British Triathlon Squad. They do not fund me, they do not help or support me, so I didn’t want to sit around a table with these people, when I could go and have dinner with Michelle, Stuart and the rest of Team Dillon.

Without getting into too much detail, words were exchanged between myself and the BTF, which I will not go into at this time. However, I will say, I did get very upset but Michelle soon sorted me out. This just proves, yet again, what a great support I have around me with Team Dillon and my family. I know these people believe in me and will be with me all the way to 2012 and beyond.

On the other hand, as always, there are some people who I feel don’t want to help or support me, and just seem to just want to make things difficult and try to put things in my way. This is just my feelings at the moment, and I hope I don’t feel this way forever.

I would like to point out that, I am not using what happened on Thursday night as an excuse for my performance on Saturday, it just wasn’t my day, but it did make me feel so angry afterwards.

Moving on, after my training was done on Friday morning we moved into the hotel, which was so close I could throw a brick from window and it would land right into Hyde Park. Carrie, the accommodation was perfect; cheap, close location, and big rooms, and I can tell you, in London, this is hard to find. Thanks sis!

Race Day

So, race morning, after I got back from my little morning run with Michelle, it was time to chill out and watch TV, have a quick look on Facebook and pass some time, the sun was out, lovely and warm already, and London WCR is awaiting.

I felt great in the swim warm up and was really ready to race. I was in a good mind set and not too nervous. Going onto the pontoon I wasn’t in the best position, ranked number 37 which meant I was placed in the middle, but I wasn’t too far away from Laura Bennett and was right next to Annabel.

The swim started and I was going fine until the first buoy and then things started to change, I have to say this was the worst swim I have ever been in, going around the first buoy I got absolutely battered.

I was being pulled left, right and centre and just couldn’t move anywhere. I panicked slightly, probably down to lack of oxygen then eventually managed to get around the first buoy, this is where the battle really commenced.

I had to try and get myself back into a decent rhythm, so I was swimming down the outside in an attempt to swim up, I was making some ground but with the girls up front really pushing the pace. It was always going to be hard but I tried swimming through on the next lap, but just couldn’t make enough ground on the main girls.

Into and out of T1, I was fine and as I looked up, I saw Nicola Spirig just in front, I thought to myself great someone to work with to get up to the main field, but there was this shiny material on the floor, which I found out after was Skins branding which I slipped on.

My bike went from underneath me and I skidded across the floor. It was quite a good skid and I’ve now got a lovely cut on my elbow and leg and a cracking graze up all the left side of my body and my back, great.

I jumped straight back on my bike and tried to bridge the gap, but I ended up being left in the jokers pack, who didn’t want to do any work apart from a couple of athletes. I said to myself I wish Lisa Norden would of come out the water with me, because I think she would of done her bit on the bike and we would have been able to bridge the gap, but it was too late, by the time she caught up to our pack, my legs were already blowing red and I think hers were too.

We went onto the run one minute and 40ish seconds down and I all I could do was run as hard as I could. I felt like I was sprinting all the way. I caught a few girls that were in the front pack and I finished second out of the joker’s pack, with Barbara Riveros beating me. I did not enjoy racing for 25th place, it was not fun on the bike, but that’s racing I suppose.

So onwards and upwards now, I have the London triathlon in two week’s time, so I’m looking forward to that. I know I am in good form at the moment and to not show that at the Hyde Park WCSR was disappointing, but I’ve got to move on now to the next one.

I just want to say a huge thank you to all my family and friends that came down to support me over the weekend. It was great having you all there and also to all the support from the crowd, London 2012 will be awesome.

So I started out for Paris on Friday afternoon and I flew over with a bunch of GB athletes including Stuart, Will, Abbie and Adam who were also racing on Saturday and also the support crew of Michelle, Sarah and Clare. As always they did a great job screaming from the sidelines, but under strict instructions from my sister Carrie, Sarah (AKA Marry Poppins) forgot the carmera, but she made up for it with having to get up at 4.30am to watch the 6.00am start! LOL.

The flight went fine and I met Cedrick (Possiy coach) at the airport and went back to his parents house were I was truly spoilt (again) and was greeted by a lovely dinner, after which I near enough went to bed. Sleeping like a baby… until the mosquito incident where Kerry Lang decided the fill our room with mosquito spray in the middle of the night, (talk about choking, bloody things!) apart from that I slept pretty well.

On the Saturday me and Kerry took off for a little run and then back for breakfast, followed by swimming at the pool where I got to meet some more of the famous Poissy team. It was a very relaxed day, spending most of my time off my feet and getting ready for the race. We found the BEST baguette shop for lunch and then later went round to Martin’s house for a big Poissy team dinner, it was really nice to meet most of the team there. The women Poissy team consisted of Jodie Swallow (JS1), Kerry Lang, Erin Densham, Marine Bonnetaud, Jade Diemunsch, Berengere Abraham and me.

Race morning

Me and Jodie (JS1) set our alarms for 3:30am so we’d be ready to leave the hotel at 4.00am ahead of the bright and early start of 6:00am. With it still being pitch black outside, I went downstairs to the reception to get a coffee to have with my Powerbar performance bar (of course the chocolate flavour, anyone who knows me will know I do love my chocolate flavour, no matter what time it is) then Cedrick picked us up and down to the race venue we went.

I was quite cold on race morning but considering it was 4.30am, I think that’s probably about right! So, we set up transition and I went for a warm up, then down to the swim start. We had some entertainment at the swim start, where we were joined by some early morning boozers, that obviously hadn’t stopped partying yet. They decided when the girls were jumping into the river to get to the pontoon, that they wanted to joins us, three of the men tried to get past the marshalls, with one succeeded and jumped in with just his boxers on, but the marshalls managed to get him out before we started. Very funny at the time though.

The race was off and Berengere started off faster than everyone else and didn’t slow down, Abbie Thorrington was the only girl who could swim with her, but I had a good swim on Kerry Langs feet and swam the 750m course next to team mate Erin Densham. So, out of the water and with the long 300m run up to T1 I was up where I needed to be, so onto the bike and in the lead pack, but yet again, the bike was extremely slow for the whole 20k and, I just sat there and was quite happy to wait for the run.

I got into a good position going into T2 and got out of T2 in third place, as soon as you get onto the run course, it’s straight uphill, and at the top of the hill I found myself leading which is exactly the position I love to be in, and I stayed there for the full 5k. However… I was not alone, and as I was running found that Barbara Riveros was on my heels.

Coming onto the final 800m I found there was another person in our party, Emma Jackson (AUS). Barbara put the first surge in for the finish line, I reacted and took the final left turn to go up the 100m hill to the finish line, I had to dig real deep but was lactating to the max! It was a sprint finish between the threee of us and I ended up with the gold which I was chuffed with, and was greeted by my coach Michelle Dillon and Sarah Murphy as I crossed line. ChuffedChuffedChuffed.com

Check out the full results.

Now for next weekend, the London Hyde Park WCR, I want to end by saying a HUGE congratulations to Vicky Holland who got fifth at Hamburg on Sunday, a great result, well done Vicky!

Hope you all enjoy the race, whether you’re racing or spectating, watching it on the TV or cheering at the venue. Scream if you wanna go faster!

We’re happy to be writing to you from the very south of Poland in a mountain town called Krynica. It’s a very picturesque place with its own natural spring water, quite famous and sold throughout Poland. If you were wondering yes we did bring our little cat Amber.

We had a few days to get here so drove from our home town Torùn, up to Prague then on to Vienna, and finished up in Zakopane. Amazing drive and stopped over in three beautiful cities, if anything I just wish we’d had a bit more time and money to see more of the places.

The weather has been stunning with it not dropping below 30 degrees but maintaining a nice breeze, which is perfect when you are running for hours. We are here training under our Polish coaches and attending their annual Polish squad camp, which includes many various activities and is set out in a very organised manor so we can just get on and work!

We’ve been running up mountains, plenty of core fitness sessions, gym workouts, aqua athletics, sports specific stuff and of course lots of ice time. It really is all the little things we appreciate though, just great to get back from training and food is prepared for you and the maids have tidied your room so you can just collapse in bed.

This is week two of the camp and the third season we’ve started on ice training in this way. We start very basic and easy, then by the end of the four week camp we build to our harder elements and full programs.

It’s always hard at the start of a season as just a few weeks out can really hit fitness and stamina hard. Our sport requires a lot of explosive power and this time of the year can put major strains on most your big muscle groups so you spend ten minutes getting down a flight of stairs for breakfast every morning.

But all is well and we are very happy with our progress so far, we are very keen to achieve major leaps in our game and can only get through hard work.
Anyway, have to get warmed up for the ice but will speak to you all soon.