Count Down

Time is getting pretty short now, we are only two sleeps away from the World Championship 70.3 Women's race and three sleeps away from the Men's race. Things will be getting awfully real for the competitors.

I have three athletes over in South Africa racing this year. Two are married athletes from Singapore and one is a female competitor from Perth (who is from South Africa originally). Their stories for being in South Africa are all different, but hopefully they will all have one thing in common over the weekend.

Owen and Hayley from Singapore have been having a great season so far. This year they have raced at the Vietnam 70.3 and the European 70.3 Championships. Both of these races yielded significant PBs and so they have been improving over the season. The European Championships saw Hayley break 6 hours for the first time and Owen break 5 hours for the first time. Solid gains. For the World Championships they are both fitter than they have been all year and have had pretty good preparations. I would say they are as ready as they can be. Given the improvements we have seen over the year I am hoping both Owen and Hayley are prepped for season best performances, I certainly think they are capable of them if they can execute their race plans well.

Anne has had a bit more of a broken preparation. Anne is a very accomplished athlete, but she has had her season hampered by injury. She was all on track for the World Championships, but injury prevented her from qualifying at Busso Half in May. The lack of qualification pretty much put the idea of 70.3 worlds to rest, however, she then managed to get a slot through the Women for Tri program. Since getting an entry Anne has gradually been returning from injury to the point that I think she is now ready to race. Anne feels that her preparation has been a little underdone due to a lack of running, however, I suspect she will surprise herself. I think she is ready for good day out.

All up I think the athletes are all ready to go. They have trained well, tapered well and have ticked all the boxes they need to in preparation for race day. It won't be long now until all they have to do is line up on the start line, roll the dice and follow their plans.

I will be watching very closely.