Plover Cove ITU Continental Cup - race report

Last Monday I travelled to Hong Kong to race in the Plover Cove ITU Continental Cup Triathlon, in an attempt to salvage a good result from an otherwise somewhat disappointing season.  Staying with my friend and former housemate and Mount Allison swim teammate Nick Crowe, I had a great chance to rest up and prepare for a Saturday morning start at 7:20am.

After successfully navigating my way around the city a few times, and consulting with Nick and our friend (and fellow Cumberland County denizen!) Deanna Dobson, I was confident that we had all the bases covered for the slightly long and complicated trek to Plover Cove from Hong Kong island.  However, when Saturday morning came, we ended up having a real Hong Kong adventure getting to the race site - the lady driving the taxi said she knew where we were going, but then changed her mind once we were in the cab!  I ended up getting into the transition area quite a bit later than usual, but was still in a good mental state - panicking about things over which you have no control has never helped anybody.

The swim start was from a pontoon, and the positioning was quite even across the start line, so the start went quite well.  However, after about 200m, the pack split into two groups and I was forced to choose one - at which point I began to lose touch with the main group, and by the first turn buoy at 365m, there was already a gap between myself and the tail end of the main group.  Frustrated but not ready to give up, I put my head down and tried to catch the group for the remainder of the swim, but to no avail - I exited the water 3 minutes down on the leaders and almost 2 minutes off of the 2nd pack.  This was very disappointing, since I've been doing so much good work in the pool lately and thought it would be much better this time.

I went out onto the bike knowing I would have to dig deep to try to catch the 3rd pack, after a lead group of three emerged and the 2nd and 3rd packs were fairly sizable and would work well together on a very straight, although hilly, course.  Catching a few of the riders who were dropped from the main packs or got stranded in between, I brought a couple of guys along with me as I started to gain a bit of time on the 3rd group.  However, my two riding companions could just stay on my wheel, and as such I rode solo the whole way and lost a bit of time back on the last lap.  Only losing 25 seconds to the 3rd pack, and riding well, I just couldn't compete with the strong front groups, and entered the run over 6 minutes off the leaders and with no way of running into a top 10 position.

Coming out of T2, I had a bit of a snag - as a result of my rushed transition setup, I hadn't noticed a plastic razor cover in one of my racing flats!  I had no choice but to stop and take it out, and lost at least 5 seconds to my riding partners on the way out of transition.  However, back onto the run, I picked up the pace and got ready to push myself to as fast a run as possible.  Focusing on catching as many guys as possible from the groups ahead of me, I got into a really good rhythm and pushed hard in the hot, humid sun as it pounded down on us on the beautiful Plover Cove Dam.  Passing a few guys along the way, I ended up having my fastest run of the season - 35:38.

Overall I ended up in 13th place out of 26 starters ... even after such a terrible swim, only 1 spot off of my best ITU result to date.  A bit disappointing since I was sure I was going to be able to hang on in the swim this time, but once the swim clicks in and I get into that 2nd or 3rd pack I'll hopefully be running for the top  5 instead of 12th or 13th.  Hopefully next time will be different!

You can check out photos of the race and my trip at:

http://picasaweb.google.com/aaronjlwebb/HongKongPhotos

Thanks for reading,

Aaron