Hey Everyone,
Wow, what a race!!! My legs are screaming at me big time!!

Today I raced the Revolution 3 half here in Quassy, Connecticut. The scenery is so beautiful here with stunning lakes and rolling green hills, reminds me a lot of home.

The pro field here was unbelievable with the best of the best on the start line, including Craig Alexander, Matt Reed, Ritchie Cunningham and Joe Gambles to name a few.

The gun went off at 6.50am.........tick tick boom, we were now off on the 1.2 mile swim around Lake Quassapaug. Got into a great rhythm early on in the swim and managed to get onto the feet of Matty Reed. He is an amazing swimmer and I knew if I stayed close to him I would come out of the swim in a great position.

Came out of the water with Matt and most of the other main competitors and out on to the incredibly challenging and tough 56 mile/90 km 1 loop bike course. This was the hilliest bike course I have ever raced on and it was a matter of pacing myself and not losing the front bunch so that I still had a little left in the tank for the run. For most of the bike 6 athletes stayed together while Bjorn Andersson flew right past us early on in the bike like we were standing still. Joe Gambles then came through the pack and managed to get a 1 minute gap on us.

Arrived in transition with Craig and Matt, 2.30 minutes down on Bjorn and 1 minute down on Joe Gambles. Matt set the pace early on in the run and he was flying, if I wanted to have a chance at taking the title I had to stay with
him. By mile 4 on the run we had dropped Craig Alexander and had about a 1 min gap back to him. Matt and I now thought it was game on between just the 2 of us so we slowed down slightly and found a more comfortable pace. Feeling really comfortable now and running side by side with Matt half way through the run, I now had to make sure I paced myself well so that I still had something left in the tank to get to the finish line first. Looking back over my shoulder at around mile 9 Craig was in my sight again and catching really fast.....bugger, I thought he was down and out. I now had to put the hammer down as Craig was flying toward us. With only 4 miles to go I managed to drop Matt Reed and have a slight gap on Craig Alexander. By mile 10, Craig had caught me and we were running side by side. I managed to stay with him for another mile but he eventually dropped me and unfortunately I had nothing left in the tank to go with him. With Craig now running away from me I knew I had to keep pushing to get to the finish line if I wanted to finish on the podium. Finally made it to the finish line in 2nd, 1 minute behind Craig Alexander and with Matty Reed 2 minutes back from me in 3rd to round out the podium.

All in all this race was unbelievable and really happy with the 2nd place result. With the stellar line up of Pros, grueling race course, incredible venue and professionally run event by Todd and Heather Gollnick and her Revolution 3 team, I will definitely be back here again next year.

Next stop is Cambridge, Maryland for the Eagleman 70.3 on the 13 June.

Goedemorgen Idereen,

Well its been six weeks since I swapped kiwi roads for the Belgian low lands. This is my second experience as I have lived and raced here as an under 23 rider for two and half years up until 2004. Not a lot has changed in the highly competitive racing scene, it is still tough as nails and there is no forgiveness for anyone not meeting the required fitness level.

My first few races were big, with fields full of professional riders, some of whom I raced with five years ago and even a few friendly ex-team mates. Pleasantries aside and down to business, I was schooled pretty hard on what I’ve been missing out on. One of the old friends I was reacquainted with was the gutter. I spent a lot of my first race, GP Pino Cerami, getting to know it again as our race was blown into an orderly single file by the typical early season weather.

I have had a few issues in getting set up here, but our racing schedule is only once a week so I have had necessary time to work on re-building the racing machine I used to be. The weather is working on itself too, yesterday was 8’C and rain but is getting better and better each week!

Tomorrow I hope to hear if I have made the team for Tour of Belgium (2.HC) our new teams biggest start of the year. I am getting faster with every race, and on Saturday won the bunch sprint of the GP Houthalen after working for 80km trying to bring the break back. We were only 10sec off catching eventual winner and ex-pro Stijn Ennekens.

We have a few good one day races in the next six weeks, so hopefully I can show my stuff there and work on getting noticed by one of the big teams. Its an inspiring part of the world to be racing in, with the Giro on telly and heaps of motivation to pull a result.

Below is a pic from Saturdays race, I hope this finds everyone well. Hope to be in touch again soon.

Instead of a blow by blow race report this time there is a link to an interview after the race. Check out the Memorial Hermann 70.3 race update on the below video thanks to Xtri. It was a tough day at the office but the legs seem to have taken a step up from last week's race in New Orleans.

Another top field here this week including Andy Potts, Chris Lieto & Tim O'Donnell to name a few. To round off the top 3 we had Tim O'Donnell (1st American) and Chris Lieto, all rocking KSWISS shoes. Sam McGlone took out the womans race.

Next Stop St. Croix in the US virgin Islands where another top field awaits.

If you are interested in seeing more of what I am up to on the road along with real time race updates you can follow my twitter posts by clicking this link http://twitter.com/terenzo1 and setting up an account

Here is the link to the Xtri interview http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OJmFILLXDPY

Yesterday was the first 70.3 (Half Ironman) of the season for me here in New Orleans. It was my first time visiting the big Easy and I will leave with nothing but good memories of the City.

I arrived on Wednesday evening after a long trip from New Zealand, actually it was more like Thursday morning, but who's counting days. I managed to get a few good nights sleep thanks to my friends Imovan and Melatonin, but I
still struggled to get out of bed at 4am on race morning. Luckily I set 3 alarms!

The pro field was world class and included Chris "Macca" McCormack, Andy Potts, Paul Amey & Dirk Bockel just to name a few. I arrived in Transition at 6 to find out my new Lazer helmet, that came in from Europe didn't have the correct US safety sticker and I wasn't allowed to use it. Thankfully Jim, a kind age grouper gave up his aero helmet for me.

We kicked off the swim in the rough conditions with fellow New Zealander Graeme O'Gradey pushing the pace in the chase pack behind the leader, Potts. Sighting the buoys was pretty tough but we managed to navigate through the
1900m swim losing 1minute 30seconds. This was not a good deficit to have on Potts but I wasn't going to wreck my race by chasing him the first half of the bike. I tried to ride steady and strong for the first 45km/ 28miles then decided it was time to work on catching up as there no way of challenging for the victory from so far back.

I timed my chase perfectly and caught Potts within the last mile. This was going to make for an interesting race. I sped through transition gaining a small lead while he was putting his socks on... I think he has delicate feet (shhhhh, don't tell him I said that though). My lead was quickly eaten up and he came past me like a man possessed. I felt pretty good, the legs were turning over well but I just couldn't change gears to go with him. I was stuck in my own rhythm with no deeper to dig.

The 21km/ 13mile from Lake Ponchatrain to downtown New Orleans went by reasonably quick and soon I was running through the French Quarter in second place. It had been a good day and although 1st place would have topped off
my experience of New Orleans I was contempt to settle for second... this time around. Potts is a class athlete and I just wish he wouldn't have made the victory look that easy. Paul Amey rounded off this top 3, and fellow Kiwi, Sam Warriner took out the girls race.

A quick thanks to a local kid - Sam Leblanc who helped me out all week with food, training and transport. Would have struggled without his local knowledge.

Next stop, Galveston, Texas for the US national 70.3 championships next weekend.

So another 2nd at Ironman New Zealand to kick off the year. Not what I came out here to achieve but all in all it was an okay result.

We kicked off at 6:45 on Saturday morning, the lake was calm and the wind was down. I knew all I had to do was sit on Kieran Doe's feet and we would have a good swim. This was easier said than done! With John Key firing the
cannon 'BOOM' and we were off and we quickly got a gap on the field, the only problem was that I was giving it far too much effort to sit behind him in his wake, so much that I think I strained my abdominals half way through. I had to sit up and take a few deep breaths, the pain was agonising, I thought my race was over. I slowed down and pulled through the water more gently, the gap to Doe boy in front was getting bigger and the gap to Cam Brown behind was being eaten up quickly. I couldn't wait for the end of the swim to start using some different muscles. The end soon came and the deficit behind Doe was only 1 minute. I pushed through Transition and to keep every second I had over Brownie because I knew I was going to need it as the day went on.

Jumping on the bike I felt great, I quickly caught up with Doe. well, I actually think he was waiting for me. Soon I was on my own out the front, riding way too quickly, something I was going to pay for later in the day. My watts and heart rate were not too high but it just shows in an Ironman that even a small percentage wrong in the effort levels and you will
struggle. Soon I was up to 4 minutes over Brown, then it went to 5, then 6, then 7 minutes. After 1 lap I was back in town and had an 8 minute lead over Cam Brown, Kieran Doe and James Bowstead (up and coming 23 year old who
suffered similar problems to me during the race but he will be a great athlete in the years to come). Now the wind had started to pick up and the glycogen in the legs was running out. My muscles were fatiguing quickly and
this is when I realized that I had timed everything wrong. I set out to try and get 8minutes over Cam going into the run. I didn't need this time at 90km. I managed to hold on to 7 minutes of this by the 140km mark but once
we turned into the head wind for the final stretch home every pedal stroke was an effort. The gap quickly came down and soon we were back in town jumping off our bikes and I only had a minute up my sleeve. BUGGER!!!

I was curious to see how I would run with all the fatigue so I set out to dowhat I thought I could. Not going too fast and just sticking to a good rhythm. Cam showed his class when he came past me at 6km flying, I soon figured out this was just a ploy to mess with my head as once he got his lead of 30seconds the gap didn't change for the next 15km. In Ironman the 20km point on the run is when you really start to struggle, you legs are sore and there is part of you that is unsure if you will even be able to run the last 20km. Thankfully there were great supporters out there and they
kept my spirits high. Soon I only had 7km's to go. The gap to Cam had grown considerably but there was also a good gap to Doe in 3rd.

The last 2km's took care of themselves with the crowds cheering so loud that it didn't even feel like I was running. Then I was home and it was all over, the pain, the cheering, the relief. I could now sit down and shut down.

A big congratulations to everyone who competed on Saturday, the conditions were tough but we all persevered through it and a huge THANK YOU to all the spectators, we couldn't have done it without you.

Cameron Brown and Jo Lawn, you guys rocked and proved that you will own Taupo for yet another year, it was a privilege to race alongside you both. Gina Crawford, Kieran Doe and the rest of the Pro's, thanks for helping to make this race so exciting.

Also thanks to the many people who have helped me out and supported me through the last few months.

Well we have finally arrived at the beginning of the season for real that is. The first round of the World Championship series kicks off this sunday in Sydney, the so called home of triathlon where we presented the first ever olympic medals our sport earned back in 2000. I can remember that day as if it was yesterday, sitting on my parents couch at home in Palmerston North watching Hamish, Craig and Ben gut it out. And then seeing this little plucky Canadian sprint to gold out of nowhere ( Simon Whitfield ) and from that moment on, the Olympics for me were more real than ever.

It's been a great summer training down in the mighty Manawatu and I've managed to tick every box I wanted to over the summer. It gives me great confidence heading into this weekends event, knowing that I've done everything my coach expected of me. Now its time to have some fun and race. It feels like yesterday I was saying to myself during a long run that I was lucky I still have 12 weeks to go. But here we are and I'm ready to go, so come sunday all those months of training will be on the starting line with me as I begin my pursuit for the World Championship in 2010.

I'm really happy to say that both SKY sport and TV1 are showing both the male and female races live on Sunday morning. Yes I know its an early start ( 9am for the guys race) but it will be well worth you to roll out of bed, grab a cup of coffee, and sit back and enjoy the show. Now that's breakfast TV at its finest, sorry Paul Henry we've got the sunday slot!
I'm also aware Tiger is back, and I know he's playing at the same time, but surely watching the fittest all round athletes in the world go at it is not even a fair competition? even for Tiger! Oh thank you so very much MYSKY for tiger of course.

I actually headed up to Auckland yesterday evening as I was lucky enough to sit in with Murray Deaker on his show on SKY sport. It was a great chance to speak to him about the passion I have for my sport with him. We also touched on what is continually needed on a daily basis to achieve the goals I have set myself within my professional sporting career. He knows only to well after interviewing so many of our great athletes that having some sort of talent is just a minor part of the puzzle.

Anyway, I hope everyone is well and look out for me over the next few days on the box as we build into the first round of the World Championship series.

Just returned last week from my first Track Nationals. I had a good week of racing, I won a silver medal in the 515m scratch race, 4th in the 500tt. Centre champs went well winning every event.

The keywins went well, I didn't pull my foot. Definitely the best pedals to use.

My next aim is to perform well at the identified key events which are; Te Awamutu and Rotorua Tours and I aiming for a podium finish at club nationals. With good results I hope to get confirmation into the squad for the Junior tour of Canberra.

Regards
Kristoff

Morning everyone,
I hope you all had time to relax over the weekend, and are trying to enjoy the last gasps of summer!! Well I'm sure it will continue, although if you felt the hurricane like front that rolled into Wellington on friday evening you would have thought summer is done and dusted.

But not to worry, Windy Wellington was back to normal come race day. So that's a hell of a lot of wind and some cooler temps when your just running around in lycra and nothing else. There were blue skies by the time we started to race. Which meant some heat from not only the big orange dot in the sky but the huge crowd supporting along the waterfront.
The weekends race doubled as both the Oceania and National championships, so both titles would be up for grabs all be it some foreigners were also racing. The race fell during a key phase of my current training program and so I had to be quite careful about how I approached it. I've been mainly focusing a lot on strength endurance over the past weeks and so it would be nice to finish it off with a bit of a hit out. The other major thing was I'd just finished a 3 week training camp with the High Performance squad at one of my favorite training places in the world the Snowfarm .The Snowfarm is situated at 1600 meters above sea level and nestled atop of the Cardrona valley between Queenstown and Wanaka in the south island. Its truly an amazing part of New Zealand and one that makes doing what I love even easier! Training had gone really well over the time there, and I'd managed to get in some good miles, all be it a little tired I was looking forward to racing.
The first race is always hard no matter what. With the training load as I mentioned before, Wellington's weather reputation, And some very classy athletes from the oceanic nations and abroad this would hurt. I knew that my main competition would come from the Three times World Champion Peter Robertson, And my good mate from France and current world number 6 Laurent Vidal. There were also 58 other guys that stood on the start line all eager to show what they had to play with to the wellington public so you always have to expect that anything could happen.

The 1500 meter swim was going to be a rough affair. The sea was chopping up nicely for us and always proves tricky to hold feet and swim fast. I thought the conditions would split the field up quite a bit, but as we exited I could see that most of the group had maintained in tact throughout. What this meant right away was from now on it was going to be a very tactical affair especially on the bike. In a big bunch of 30 plus guys you have to have your wits about you. Every one will look to position themselves within the bunch as good as they can through the 40 kilometer journey, Whilst still keeping one eye open for any possible attacks that could escape and steal a march before the run. Its part of our sport that if you get a bit lazy and relax you can be caught out in an instant so it was eyes peeled to its entirety.
As it was with the swim though the strong wind and tough bike course kept everyone together. I was more than happy to wait to fight it out on the run and so prepared for the explosions to come early. I felt great throughout the bike and so did well to conserve as much energy as I could and be as far forward in the group as I could as we dismounted our bikes into the second transition. I got it pretty right and hit the ground running at the front of the big field. After racking my bike and throwing the racing flats on I looked to try to stamp some pressure early and gain any kind of ascendence I could right off the bat. Good idea, But I forgot one thing, Peter Robertson! like a bullet he passed me after 300 meters. I felt like I must have been walking at the speed at which he passed me by. I've raced Peter enough now to know that if he gets a sniff of victory its pretty much shut the gate. I picked my pace up to try to match his increase of speed or risk being out of this race barely after it had really begun to heat up. As soon as I clawed my way back to his shoulder he took off again in true Peter style. This went on for 6 or 7 times before I finally felt like I was gaining back some control. As soon as I was positive I had harnessed some control back in my favour, I forced the pace. I slowly increased the tempo and went about applying my own pressure. Of course this was all going on within the first 2k so it was battle stations are go for a bit. Meanwhile Laurent was also surging with us and and having to decide which of us to follow. The three of us had also opened quite a good gap because of this pace and it was apparent early the winner would come from here.

After 3k Peter dropped off and then it was just down to Laurent and myself. I was happy to run in front and felt comfortable doing so. I maintained my tempo for the next 3k and just focused on what was ahead. What happened next was in some way quite funny at the time. There are a few things you learn when you do a lot of training with your best mates (who are also normally your biggest competitors) that there can still be the element of surprise. Of course you respect each other more than anything, you each make the same sacrifices to reach for the same goals. But when it comes time to race you know that each and everyone wants to win. I was thinking about this at this time but I knew Laurent was too. So at 6.5k he surged with a real change of speed. It was something Usain Bolt would be proud of. A little part of me chuckled to myself, what are we sprinting for a line we drew in the sand! he just put 20 meters on me in a flash and stopped. It was a great move and at the time took me very much by surprise. It took my another 200 meters to close back up to him once i could realize what just happened. However as soon as I got there he hit me again! this time he pushed harder and a bit longer, and found not 20 meters but around 10 seconds. And for the rest of the race he sat there in front of me at the same distance all the way to the line for the win.
So second, but first. Strange to be second but then take all the titles up for grabs, but it is what it is (And he is French). What ever the end result, the biggest thing personally was how did I fell out there?. Considering my current training load it was better than I and Chris had expected. Something that will really set me up for Sydney and the first round of the World Championship Series in a months time.

Before then I'll have a bit of an easier week starting tomorrow to get over the race and the camp. Then friday week I'll be back racing, but this time no triathlon! I'll be competing in the 5k at the New Zealand Track and Field Championships in Christchurch. It will be yet another chance to learn more from these guys who specialize in running fast.
Lastly big respect to Laurent, not only for his win but the way he raced out there. Also to Ryan for getting up to grab third overall in a good sprint finish with a bunch of guys and take out both the U23 titles that were also on offer.

Hope you are all well and I'll catch up with some of you now I'm back home of very soon in my travels.
Cheers,
Kris

Morning everyone,
Well its the day after the "Street fight in Takapuna" which did eventuate, just not with the combatants everyone had thought it would be between!

However another amazing race in front of a huge crowd along the fast and twisting course in Takapuna. I've raced in some amazing places during my time in this great sport, but there is nothing better than racing in front of a home crowd like that. It just takes you to another level even so soon into the season, you benefit so greatly from all the friendly support of all the spectators both on and off the course when you know its going live to air. TVNZ do a great job of showing our sport to all of New Zealand at home, and I hope they enjoyed just how exciting triathlon is.

Of course there was a race, and there had to be a winner. I was lucky enough to get up and take the overall honors, but I didn't have everything my own way. I say lucky because in this sport you do need you fair share of luck, and as most of you know I've missed out mine more than not over the years! This time it was Bevan's turn for things to go against him, when he unfortunately flatted on the bike. It was a real shame, and the most disappointed person apart from himself was me. There's nothing better than to gauge how you are going against one of the best athletes in the world, and I was really looking forward to our battle/fight to continue yesterday, but it was not to be. Instead I had to contend with New Zealand's next wave of future stars, and more so one that I'm mentoring very closely. Ryan Sisson's is going to be good! I've come across some very good young guys over the years, but this one is different. His continued willingness to learn makes me sit up and take real notice. He has a real grasp on how to improve the natural talent he already has. He understands it will only get him so far before the real work needs to kick in, and more often that not actually take over.
For those of you who were lucky enough to catch the race live at the venue or on television I hope you enjoyed sprint Triathlon. It was a great race for myself and I felt really good considering the training load I've been under over the past weeks. You would have seen me try and stay out of trouble as long as I could until the run where I really tried to control the race as much as I could until I finally attacked the guys on the last hill of the run. I was sure it would be the final blow but Ryan just hung tough. Not only did he hang tough, he went straight by me when we got back on the flat. We had around 800 meters to go from that point and were well clear of the others. We both knew it was going to come down to sprint time. I was fairly confident at this point but against real youth and exuberance you just never know. I kicked and kicked hard with about 300 to go and it was just good enough to break Ryan. He stayed close though and just finished 2 seconds behind for a well earned second. Also further adding to his growing reputation around New Zealand.

It's always nice to get a W and an even better way to start a season off. I'm back off to the mighty Manawatu this evening again leaving behind the big smoke until the next visit. Hopefully I'll make it back in time for the next edition of the Kids triathlon in Palmerston North. 600 kids every monday night going hell for leather around a grass field soon brings me back to why I love this sport. The smiles on there faces as they run and ride there bikes around makes it very easy for me to get up for training at 5am on Tuesday morning.

From there I'll be off to the Snowfram in the Cardrona valley with the High performance squad. We are having a three week training camp at altitude down there, and with the performances from everyone yesterday I'm sure its going to be really beneficial for all.

So off to join the rat race that is Auckland traffic and try to catch up with as many of you as I can before I jet out again. Once again thanks to you all for the kind wishes before and after the race, it was a real fun day and I hope you enjoyed it.
Cheers,
Kris