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Corinne Abraham

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Already December. Crikey Riley.

I’ve done a couple of non-race-races recently, first was a sportive around Devil’s Punchbowl in Surrey. Well it was named the Devil’s Punchbowl but it didn’t actually go past any of the view points of the geological feature and so on finishing the ride I did feel slightly robbed! Next up was Bath Hilly Half marathon which was a trail run in and around Landsdown racecourse which was STUNNING in terms of the scenery and pretty brutal in terms of the gradients!

So first off, the sportive.  For those of you who aren’t aware, sportives are organised rides, signposting and feedstations are provided and generally speaking they are timed events. However they are STRICTLY not a race… apparently!

Earlier in the year when I raced at Antwerp 70.3 I met with another Trigirl ambassador Maryvonne van den Berg and her recent blog was 10 Things I Love about Triathlon (or something along those lines – my Dutch is not great) and it got me thinking.  I often write lists and am constantly thinking of “10 Things” when I am out on my bike, in the pool or out running, (10 things I love about swimming, top 10 favourite adverts, 10 favourite dinners etc.) so it was amusing to see her doing the same thing.  Perhaps we’ll set a Trigirl trend; here are my latest “10”

Firstly I need to explain that I’m a fighter.  I don’t mean this in the sense of ‘not giving up’ or of the ninja variety*, I mean that I look like I’m battling my way though the swim, bike and run, even though I might be doing quite an easy session or feeling quite relaxed.  I look tense; I look like I’m using brute force to barge my way through the race.  Although it does me ok (!) it’s not particularly efficient and my first 3 technical corrections relate to trying to “relax” more in each discipline.

1.    Relax my shoulders on the bike. I have a tendency to hunch up my shoulders, creating tension in my neck and down my back, as well as restricting the function of the muscles that help to expand your lungs – thereby restricting my lung volume.  NOT HELPFUL!

2.    Relax shoulders on the run. Again, hunching my shoulders is not going to benefit my run.  Relaxed shoulders, relaxed arms, relaxed stride. BETTER!

Autumn – A Time for Reflection and Action Plans!

Hola!

So it is nearly end of the triathlon racing season in the UK. Leaves are turning brown, sleeves are the norm when going out on the bike and open water swim venues are closing. Booo! This means a several things to me.

1)      Reflect on my season to date
2)      Review plans for Kona 2012
3)      Draw up action plan including consideration of the following

Hi Trigirls!

I raced in Antwerp 70.3 this weekend – a beautiful city and although the bike course was not “scenic” as such as it went round and round their industrial dock yards x3… if you like industry and dock yards then this is the course for you. Personally I quite liked them but I understand that they are not everyone’s choice! It was strong winds in all directions (through and between stacks of shipping containers) but the course was pretty flat with the exception of the odd gear change for a road bridge.

Organisation was good, registration easy the day before or there was an option of registering on race morning. Racking was on race morning and we had a very sociable start time

I finished off my training week with a race. I made the long journey (all of 10min) to race at Dorney Lake this morning at the SteelMan olympic distance triathlon.

I came in first lady at 2.04.56

Swim: 0.23.40

T1: 0.01.07

Bike: 1.03.01

T2: 0.00.45

Run: 0.36.20

Many thanks to you all for all of your support – it was great to be back racing, even if it did feel like it was over before I’d started!

Next week is Henley Challenge River Swim, I’ll keep you posted…

Hello Trigirls!

Hope this finds you in good health? If the health is not so good – I hope that this finds you in good spirits! Every cloud has a silver lining and all that…

At the moment, while I’m not in perfect health (I’m having a few back problems that have prevented me from long distance triathlon racing so far this season), I still feel that there is plenty to work on, and there is plenty of hope on the horizon.  I’ve just had to re-evaluate my short-term goals and while I’m confident that my long-term goal of racing at the World Championships Ironman in Hawaii (in 2012) is still achievable, it is going be via a different route to the one planned at the beginning of this year.

So what are your triathlon or training goals? Are they achievable? Are they too easy even? Do they need re-evaluating? I try and have goals for every session; it can take less than 30seconds to clarify what the