Blog » Europe update - June 2013
Europe update - June 2013
Not long after touching down back in NZ from Taiwan it was time to jump back on a big aeroplane again and shoot off to Europe for the first time in a few years. I was heading to Gigean, between Montpellier and Sete, in the South of France. This is Laurent Vidal and Andrea Hewitt’s Northern hemisphere summer training and living base.
They have an incredible set-up in Gigean/Sete and it was great to be made to feel right at home as soon as I made the train trip from Marseille.
The training and climate are simply awesome, and together with that homely feel I finally think I’ve found a place that I can call a home away from home and a place I can get the job done in the Northern Hemisphere, something I’ve never done in the past.
I’ve never truly been happy or settled anywhere other than in Christchurch or Wanaka, but can now add Gigean to the list!
After a couple of big weeks training I headed back to Germany for my first hit out of the European summer. Challenge Kriachgau is an amazing course, challenging, crazy spectators and generally great weather. Come race morning though it really decided to rain after a couple of stella days. Thunder and lightning were right above us and the right decision was made to postpone the race by 1 hour. There were some big German names racing Kraichgau, as it was the German half-distance championships. I was coming in pretty heavy from training, but I was really looking forward to racing hard and mixing it up a little more than I have done with my two iron-distance races so far. I knew I definitely wouldn’t get it my own way like I had in those 2 races.
I got passed in the swim about halfway by some fish and as I was feeling rather terrible there was no way I could go with him. I’ve later learned that he was one of Germanys top open water swimmers and has just made the switch to Triathlon. So maybe even if I was feeling awesome I still wouldn’t have been able to swim with him… he is doing Roth, so I guess I’ll find out. Anyway, myself and German legend Maik Petzold came out about of the water about 20seconds down on him, but I managed to get out of transition first and off on the bike.
To my surprise I had some good legs and started moving along reasonably well. It had stopped raining, I think, but the roads were still soaking week. I hit the first round-about with speed and hit the deck even faster. I slid a good distance, almost had time for a cup of tea, but had plenty of time to almost sit-up and enjoy the slide. It was a weird feeling, it was almost fun and yet I knew the whole time I was sliding that I was losing skin.
Anyway I was only about 2km in and my hopes of a good result kept riding past me while the medics did there thing. After about 5 minutes I was allowed to sign my life away and get going again. I had to finish the race as it was always planned as a key session to end a couple of big weeks and I felt as though if I missed it I was losing a lot more than some skin.
It took a while to get the legs pumping again, but managed to get a good ride out of it and then a good hit out on the run. I’m a true diesel now, I actually couldn’t have run any faster, but felt that overall I could have done an iron-distance race that day. This was a good sign to me 5 weeks out from Roth and similar to my chain of thought prior to Taiwan.
I have spent the last 5 days back in my old German club city of Darmstadt with the latest kiwi addition to their team, Cam Goldsmid. Keep an eye on that boy, he’s got some speed and a lot of determination! It was great to be back in Darmstadt and to catch up with everyone. It was a surreal feeling to be back there in a completely different situation to the years past. A much better situation I would say!
So, I am sitting on the train heading back to Gigean, its hot and sunny and tomorrow I start the final 2 week push for Roth. I really cannot wait to race Roth. The pressure is on, but I’m enjoying it and it is keeping me extremely honest in everything I do. I head that way on the 2nd of July for some recon and the gun goes off on the 14th July.
Hope everyone is doing great in whatever it is you are doing and where ever you are.
Will catch up soon.
Cheers
Dylan
Check out my media page for some photos of the first month here in Europe.
