Rebekah Keat

Hi All,

Well I am back home after my first race back since Hawaii in October. I competed yesterday in the Geelong 70.3 World Triathlon Circuits first race of the year. My swim started well and I was at the back of the lead Men’s swim pack and also with the lead female swimmer. Nervs got the better of me though about half way round the swim course, as I wondered what I was doing staying with the pro men. I dropped of the back of the pack but still remained 3rd overall position out of the water.

A bit of a tricky transition as my blueseventy wetsuit that had seved me very well in the swim, once again got stuck on my over sized calfes! I struggled a little to get it off but was out in the bike 1min 15sec down on the lead female. “No worries” i thought.

The bike consisted of 3 laps to make up the 90km. I felt good with the wind behind me heading out I managed to really wind it up. I also managed to hold off strong riders Belinda Granger and Libeth Kristianson (ex-world long course champion) who excited the swim only 30 or so seconds behind me. By the end of the first lap though I had been joined by the two, and as a pack of men came through I was tempted to jump on the back. I didnt though, and Belinda and I stayed honest riding solo again! We noticed we had not lost anytime to Yvonne Vanklerken (the World record holder) and she was still a good 3 or 4 mintues down after the second lap. I was placed 3rd with Granger and we had now also reeled in Pip Taylor (lead swimmer). Sam warriner was having a blinder and leading the race with one lap to go.

Tragedy struck and out of no where Vanklerken appeared, and so did about 8 other male age groupers! The three of us, who had been honest all day, were pretty shocked to be caught so quickly with the draft busters not doing alot to bust the drafters. Again, it was very tempting to jump on the back of the pack! Reluctantly, again, the three of use girls stayed back and rode alone watching the wo women leaders ride off infront of us! I pushed hard for the last 15km and all three of us managed to all get off the bike together only about 3 minutes down, quiet good considering we rode into a 30km head wind with no help!

I jumped off the bike ready to run the fastest ever 21km of my life – my legs felt great, so I was motivated to give it all. The run is my strength and in my mind I believed I could catch possibly two, if not all of the girls infront! I hammered out the first 7km as hard as I could but in control and stying focused on the job ahead. At the 7km turn on completion of the first lap I had made up about 20 seconds on Yvonne but was still a good 3 minutes down on race leader Warriner. We were running at exactly the same pace! I knew then it was going to be really tough to reel them back in, but thought I would still just give it everything in the hope one of them may blow up and I wouldn’t!

The second lap saw us all in almost the same postion – I had made another 20 seconds or so up on the world record holder, and Sam and I passed at the exaxt same spot! “Bugger” I thought. I was running a personal best and I still was not putting enough time into them enough to catch up a place! In the end after a fastest womens run split and personal best of 120.40 seconds, I finshed just over a minute behind second place and fastest Ironwomen Yvonne and 3 minutes down on ITU World No.2 and Olympian, Warriner.

I was disappointed that my bike, or that my decisions not to go with the pack, had let me down. But at the end of the day I had an honest race and there was really nothing extra I could’ve done. What I was happy about was my improved time overall from last year on exactly the same course by well over 8 minutes! The difficult thing was, with that time I placed 2nd behing the 2007 World 70.3 Champ by 2 minutes. So this means we all just keep getting faster and pushing the boundries more and more! I am only 8 weeks into my new programme with my new coach Brett Sutton, so I guess that’s something good I can come away with.

I hope I did my Team TBB proud for my first race back. I was first Aussie accross the line, and after winning two other Australian 70.3 races last year, I was crowned Australian National Series 08 winner for the 3rd year in a row.