Vacation or World Championships?

Before the 2017 season starts up it's time to wrap up the 2016 season with a blog post!

I recently travelled to by far the nicest and hottest race venue ever! Worlds in Cozumel! The water was crystal clear and super warm! There were cruise ships everywhere. This was truly a tourist vacation destination and here I was, doing one of the biggest triathlon races in the World.

Before I left for Cozumel I had done some heat training to prepare me for the hot and humid wether conditions. The heat training was very hard and I adapted quite fast which boosted my confidence going to Cozumel.

The first swim in the ocean didn't go quite as I had hoped it would. I had never swam in the ocean before and the water tasted so gross! As I was swimming I kept getting bitten by tiny jellyfish which felt like mosquito bites. The water was very warm which was nice.

As the race got closer the days kept getting hotter and hotter! Lots of the races ended up getting postponed because it was too hot! My race was postponed to a 5:30pm start.

Since it was so hot the day of the race we were advised to keep our warm up VERY short. I don't think I've ever done such a short warm up for a race before. I biked with my two other teammates to the race sight which was about 4km away and then sat in the athlete tent and tried to cool off by drinking Gatorade slushies and putting cold towels on our legs and arms. I did a very short swim warm up as the water was so hot you didn't even cool off by jumping in! I only did half a lap of swim warm up and that was it!

I had a great start position and was right not he outside so nobody was trying to swim overtop of me at the beginning. I was 10th out of the water which I was very happy with. On the bike we had a very large group of about half the field of around 60 women. I was 5th off the bike and was ready to crush the run! Unfortunately I started to fall apart on the run and I ended up just trying to cool off and finish the race! There was 7 water stations per lap that you passed twice! In each lap there were 14 chances to get water and at each station I took 2 and sometimes 3 water bottles to try and cool off.

I ended up finishing 23rd which was not what I had hoped for but I had a great first two legs of the race! This was one of the hottest and hardest races I've ever done and it was such a great experience!

After the race my Dad and I drove all the way around the island. Being true tourists we stopped at all the beautiful beaches along the way, drank coconut water right out of the coconut and I even got my hair braided!

Now I'm in off season with no structured training, I have been going for casual runs and swims and have been mixing it up and riding my cyclecross bike on the trails before it snows here in Winnipeg!

I can't wait for the 2017 season and can't wait to see what the future holds!

I am also super excited to have the support of Princess Auto for another year of fast racing!