Trent Thorpe First ITU Podium Finish

Last weekend one of our amazing triathletes raced at the Oceania Championships placing 3rd and we ask Trent for a few words and here they are...

Oceania champs was an important race for me this year as the points that were on offer could set up my starts for the first half of the season. Knowing the work I have put in over the last 6 months with my coach I was confident with my abilities.

My start in the swim wasn’t great, I was behind a little, and this forced me to go wide and swim around some people to get up to the front, I managed to hit the first buoy in the lead which set me up for my good transition onto the bike.

Along with our good transitions and a strong group of boys, we managed to establish a breakaway. Driving hard up the hill and hitting the straits hard on our TT bars we managed to get 40 seconds clear on the rest of the field, it was a fight for the podium between our group.

On the run I went out hard with the thought of trying to break my competition early, With a convincing lead at 2.5k I knew I had to work extra hard to hold the boys off, at 4K I was finally caught and it was a fight right up until 200m to go, until I had nothing left. I had to settle for 3rd.

However it was my first real professional podium on the ITU circuit so I was really happy with myself, it has also given me a lot of confidence for my World Cup season starting at Mooloolaba.