Training on the road

OK. I know you guys probably hoped that Marloes would write another piece on our camping adventures and how I suck in dealing with strange animals, connecting electricity cables and fixing waterhoses that burst right in my face. But the thing is that we’re in Noosa right now, and Noosa is quite a triathlon heaven, so I figured it was time to update on how the training part of our trip is going here on the road….

From the early stages of planning this amazing world trip, I always considered this part (Australia, New Zealand) as the ‘travelling’ part rather than the ‘training’ part. It’s a once in a lifetime chance to see these countries like we do, so we really want to see as much as we can while we do.  Apart from that, it is good to give the body some rest and have some kind of periodization towards the races where I really want to be in top shape this year (Barcelona, Ecuador, Chattanooga). The fact that we’re travelling a lot does not mean I’m not training. I am training quite unstructured, but man, I’m enjoying it more than ever.

SWIM
In one word; AMAZING. I didn’t swim a whole lot, but when I did it was in some of the most beautiful swimming spots out there. In Sydney we went to 2 pools which are very different, but both mind blowing; the North Sydney Olympic pool and the Bondi Icebergs pool are both hard to beat when it comes to scenery. A little further into the week we walked into a nice pool in Byron Bay where I hitted a good set, as well as Lake Moogerah which was awesome to swim in.

BIKE
Riding a bike is about exploring, and with every ride being on unknown roads these days it has been absolutely awesome. The night before I want to ride my bike I open google maps and Strava and look for (what seems to be) a cool loop to ride of approximately 1.5 hours. This goes pretty well most of the time. I’ve had to ride my time trial bike on a couple of gravel roads already, but other than that the rides have been spectaculair. From the rolling hills through the vineyards of Hunter Valley to the unexpected climbing around Byron Bay and the fast stretches around Lake Moogerah, all rides have been awesome and I really feel that the power is still there. The legs are not super, but good enough and definitely better than ever in the beginning of January.

RUN
The run has been a little bit shaky. When briefly back in Holland I raced ‘the Bruggenloop’ while jetlagged and a little bit feverish/sickish. Ever since I’m dealing with a bit of ongoing pain in my right shin and calf. I tried to heal it by giving it a couple of days rest but this didn’t solve it completely. I ran slow a couple of times and the pain remained the same so yesterday I decided to enter a parkrun in Brisbane. This is a very low key run race that is mostly about having fun and is being held in numerous spots around the world (a lot in Australia). The run went quite well. It was extremely hot (36degrees at 7am in the morning) but I got 1st in the run and my shin/calf actually feels better today than it did yesterday, so maybe mixing up the pace actually helps the recovery proces. Other than the ‘injury’ the running has still been a pleasure. I just hope to be able to increase the mileage a bit to get fit enough to finish decently in Ironman Geelong 70.3 in about a month from now!

So that’s it for now. I am going to scare away some Wallaby’s (which turned out to be possums, thank you Bo van Bommel ;)) from the campervan while emptying the shit cassette. Cheers.