European Tour

Since I arrived back home from Taiwan 2 days ago, I made a “quick” check in at hospital to be treated for food poisoning and then left for Europe for races within 2 weeks.

The first race was the European cup in Holten. I was still feeling a bit sick form the food poisoning that I got in Taiwan, but my spirit was high and I hoped for the best. The day before the race I trained a bit of 3 disciplines – wasn’t on top, but ok. On race day the sky was blue and the water was warm, it was perfect for the race. I started the swim pretty good until the first buoy, but then I was kicked, smacked and just beaten around. This lap was disappointing as I saw a group just about 30m in front of me. On the 2^nd lap I felt a lot better and started to catch them. In the end they were about 10m ahead of me. I sprinted through transition and was on my bike head down and smashing myself to get to the group with a few other athletes. This lasted about 3km until my body said “okay it’s enough - time to stop”. I was sick again and obviously not 100% recovered from the food poisoning. I was so disappointed after being forced to stop, but still had the World Cup in Tiszaujvaros to look forward to.

In Tiszi I felt much better and ready to rock and roll. I thought this was going to be a good race; it consisted of 3 heats and the final the following day.  I was placed in the 3^rd heat. The heats were taking place on Saturday and the final was scheduled for Sunday. It was sure to be very hard racing, because it was a World Cup and the quality of athletes were really good.

The swim consisted of 3 laps of 250m which was tough, 11 corners in the swim, that meant a lot fighting was going to happen. I started next to a “giant”, and I just hoped – please, please don’t dive onto me during the start. Unfortunately that just happened!! I decided to give it my all and swam like never before. Me and a few other athletes just missed the pack and was cycling hard to catch them, but disaster struck again - I got a puncture at about 5km in the cycle. I couldn’t believe it, so much bad luck in 2012?!

Later I realised that this is all part of the sport and life – just always train hard, believe, head up and never give up.

The tour was absolutely amazing.  Thank you to everyone who made it possible – TSA and LOTTO the Managers. A huge thank you also to my personal sponsors: Futurelife, K-Swiss, ASG, Biogen, Compressport, CycleOps, Tuks and HPC for there support and trust in me.

Then also to my Mom, Dad and brother for always supporting me.

But most of all thank you to God for the talents that he gave me and keeping me safe.

I’m on a short break now  -  so until next time

Cheers

University World Champs – Chinese Taipei

It will be the first race since the Corporate Ironman Challenge way back in April. I was also excited to catch up with Wian and Wikus, my friends and training partners, who left for Europe a few weeks earlier.

Wian, Mari, Wikus, Rozi, Rudolf, Carlyn, Jono

Once we got to the hotel after the long flights to Taipei, the first thing that went through my mind, was …… holy crap this place is hot like hell! I enjoyed the heat for about the first hour because its winter back in SA. We built our bikes and then rested in the room until Wian and Wikus arrived. When we saw each other, we were very happy and went crazy for a few min. The first two days, we spent just talking and catching up. We chatted and joked throughout the week while all the other athletes were much more serious.

Having fun - Danny Su

The Hotel in Taipei was amazing! Each team had their own helper form the University, our guide(helper) was Danny Su, he was one of the most friendly and helpful persons I’ve ever met. Even though he struggled to speak English, he really tried his best to help us in every way possible. Thumbs up to our team manager, Jono.  Jono was also a fun guy to have around and on top of everything during the whole trip. But hats off to him he really made the tour easy for us - he made sure that we only need to focus on the race and everything else will be sorted.

The opening ceremony

On race day it was hot as hell and was going to be tough, the water temperature was 30 degrees so you knew that today was going to be a hectic day. I had a pretty good swim, leading the 2nd pack out the water with Wikus. Wian was in the front pack about 16 seconds ahead. Wikus and I cycled well together with the French and Japanese athletes to catch the front pack. Once we caught them it was like an easy Sunday cycle. Nobody wanted to work on the bike so we relaxed and took it easy, I think everyone was saving for the very hot run that was coming up. Once the run started I felt pretty good until about 5km to go when I started cramping and the heat got to me. I suffered through last 5km and made it 19th over the line, but I felt dead. Wikus and WIan had an amazing race ending up 4th and 9th respectively, congrats to them!

During the prize giving that evening, we all just wanted to have a good time and party, but when the medals were handed out, we realised that we won the bronze medal in the team competition. We went absolutely crazy - it was so amazing to have won a medal at a World Championships.

With the bronze medals

Thank you very much to everyone – my parents and sponsors - who made this trip possible. Thank you to Jono and my team mates, Wikus, Wian, Mari, Rozi and Carlyn for an amazing tour.

I’ll be racing next weekend a European cup in Holton so until then……

Cheers

Rudolf