Walnut Grove Triathlon!

The last days to register for the Walnut Grove triathlon are today and tomorrow at race package pickup. Go and race this great local race put on my TriGeeks and a whole bunch of other great people. This event should be a great one with the amazing summer weather. Even if it's you first time, just go out and do it!

First Lake Swim - back into it

After some downtime/recovery post Ixtapa crash I'm now back up into it. The wounds on my hands are no longer open which makes life easier and the big guy on my hip is now manageable and starting to close up. With the help of my special bandages and a wetsuit I got in with the crew at Thetis lake. Shook out the bugs, looking forward to getting fully back up and rolling soon.
Check out this video the guys at Mindshift CSL put together! awesome.
P.S. look out for the Thetis lake monster!

North Shore and Ixtapa

With the start of the racing season came a significant amount of excitement towards racing as and elite. My experiences with flats in Chile and then in Florida brought about hopes that I had used up all my bad luck and was now heading toward some great racing. This is still true in part as North Shore on the 23rd was a successful racing tune up for the main focus - Ixtapa. It was a fun swim with team mate Aaron Thomas on my heels for the swim, we worked together for the first bit of the bike. After one 5 km loop we pulled back to meet up with four other athletes with energy conservation in mind. The pack was frustrating at times to work with and the pace was relaxed, this was going to be a run race. We headed into transition and the hilly 5 km was off with a bang. This soon split up with three strong and committed runners establishing a lead. After 3km I trailed by a ways and was able to watch Jeff and Marc battle it out for first position at the turn around. Huge credit to up and comer Lehm for keeping those fast guys within reach. For myself the race was a good experience, confirming my strengths and allowing me to go through the motions heading toward the Ixtapa Pan American Cup. See results here. It's always great to race north shore and see all the familiar faces. Great event, great people, and this year no rain!

On to Ixtapa. The travel went seamlessly and our accommodations on arrival where more than easy to settle into. Pre-race training was smooth and the heat soon became manageable. The senior guys + Alex were fun to hang out with before the race, keepin it real. Walking up to the startline I was confident, relaxed and ready to go, nerves didn't come into play really. This I think was because the swim doesn't ever present a concern or too much stress for me. The choppy 1500m swim was taken out really easy by the field. I'm sure the hot conditions and a long race ahead had it's influence. I stayed mid/front pack and kept out of the trouble making sure not to burn all the tank off at once. The run to transition was a long one and I ended up exiting T1 beside Kyle Jones. The front pack had split a gap of about 150m or so on those of us who trailed behind but this was reeled in within about the first 3 kms or so. Again the pace was chill aside from a few accelerations here and there, everyone thinking about the hot 10km run ahead. We rounded the far turn around and the amoeba was strung out briefly along some gradual climbs heading back. It was clear that a few people had ideas of creating a break or two, but when the pack is composed of 30 or so riders the gap evaporates rapidly. So it was sit and wait, go with hill accels, hydrate, spin, relax, prepare for the hot run ahead. This brought me through transition and out onto the start of our second 20 km loop. The riding was fairly clean and I think I got a too comfortable, especially with the idea that Elite riders are well Elite riders with heads straight on their shoulders. This is an assumption one should never make - I learned the hard way. Note to self: stay on your toes at all times. The pack had just rounded a corner and the straight shot ahead was taken at a stupidly relaxed pace. I was chillin up front next to Bird man when he was "rubbed" out by a careless rider. This athlete showing complete disregard for the athletes around him stops pedalling and drops back after his pull to grab a drink... that just aint cool.  Like Bird there was the initial desire to hop back up and catch the pack, but a roadrashed and battered hip made it hard to walk to my bike. The disappointment hit me and the first though was "really? 3rd DNF in a row... $%&*#$@*%#@&!" The ambulance came and the wounds were sanitized... mmmmmmm pain. got a pic in the local newspaper...

So that's that I guess, never fun to not finish but going forward is all I can do. In the words of Monty Python "Tis but a fleshwound!"














north shore picture courtesy of mark bates

  

Racing begins

So it's been a while since my last post.. This is for a few reasons. Finished up with exams which was a hectic ordeal. Moved into my new place as of May 1st and had much work to do with this. Been busy with a few things but it's all settling out now and just in time for the start of the season. I'll be doing a pre-season warm up at the north shore sprint triathlon on the 23rd in north van. This is followed by my flight to Ixtapa Mexico on the 24th to meet up with some fellow Canadians and others for the Continental cup on the 28th. So the next few days continue on with school, packing, training (in the heat box at PISE), treatment for a recovering shoulder, o and eating and sleeping in there with some other things too. Weathers great now in victoria, which makes everything better in it's own way. Not much to say other than I'm stoked to go out and get some racing in!
Until something eventful,
Cole

Back home!

So its a been a while since my last post. The semester is coming to a close and so the papers and studying have been flying in and out.  Settling into Victoria after the Florida camp was a good welcome home. The tan seemed to wash away quicker than I would have liked but the Vic life is great. Training is going smoothly. It's nice to stop and appreciate the fact that I'm fit and injury/sickness free, because you don't usually until it hits the fan. The flights home from Florida  to Vancouver got me home in time to meet with Mindshift - CSL for a photo shoot and interview. Was a lot of fun, and something pretty new for me. The support is amazing and I pictures are awesome! Win Win.
Looking forward to the 5km Champs this Saturday.

Picture: Carl Philibert VP of Mindshift CSL & Me.

a prayer to the flat tire gods... forgive me my past neglect (Clermont sprint ITU)

So i must admit, I have mocked the gods of triathlon. In particular the ones with control over flat tires. Beginner's luck? I can't be sure but I can be sure of a few things. Never assume a rider will keep a clean line. This is especially true around 180degree turns. I am a reasonably aggressive rider and know how to watch out for things in cycling. This comes as a result from lots of practice in Crit races. I cannot stress the benefits of learning how to ride in the dangerous packs. It's key to be mindful of your surrounding and be loud and communicate. you can never assume someone will hold their line. As i did today. Heading into the first turn around at 2.5km I was one of the top 5 or so riders. I had made a decision to stay near the front as it's always safer. Even so I went into the counter clockwise turn around with a Mexican on my right and an American on my inside left. My front wheel was tagged as the rider to my inside swung wide toward the end of the turn. According to weirdtristats.com (and a particular peer edited article on a scientific study*1) I managed to succeed in meeting the 1/13,869 (0.0000721%) chance of a competitors derailler catching at breaking off the valve stem of the tire. I've never heard of this happening... but it did. This immediately took all the air out of my front tire.  In addition to being taken down. I hopped back up rather quickly as the secretory Chromaffin cells within my adrenal medulla pumped a solution consisting of 80% epinephrine, 20% norepinephrine, and a little bit of Dopamine for fun, through my body. I had hoped that the sound of a flat was not me and was ready and able to jump back in with the pack, as they had slowed down significantly for the turn and I was in the front half. I was stopped short. At this time my i left loose a few profane statements and cleared the course.  Came out out with only a few scraps to my ankle, knee and hip. Bit of aesthetic damage to the my amazing Bont shoes and white speed machine but nothing big.  Will race another day. The event brings with it quite a bit of frustration as my race was going very well and I felt really on top of my game. I came out of the water (wading pool?) with a very significant lead after what seemed to me to be an easy run/swim.   My heart rate felt like it was under 120 for the entire swim/run. I'm sure it was higher but heading into it I  felt calm and relaxed. I admit I was skeptical and unconfident in my ability to come out with a lead. Just because of the fact that the first and last 200m of the swim was in water 6 - 24inches deep. Wish my boy Sharpie was up there with me and was able to race. His long legs would been perfect for this pseudo-duathlon. We could crushed together. I think my standing in the swim relied on my staying calm and not sprinting at full tilt the first 100m of the swim. I stayed behind and then made a surge once people began to dolphin dive, got clear water just before the first bouy at 400m and I was gone. You go a lot faster without someone leeching off your hip. This was a confidence booster and I was able to cruise into T1 keeping it relaxed, just like the start. Leave more training time to Bike-Run focus? Just kidding, I know as soon as I race with a stronger swim weighted field I'll be eating those words. Good experience, bad turn of events (no pun-intended ;) ). Excited for the next opportunity. Gonna go for a run now and enjoy the sun before I go home to Victoria. Watch for some of the NTC squad on Hockey night in Canada today, Habs VS. Tampa.  The boys are making use of the cheap ticket prices down here for some good hockey. Wish I could be there but have some studying to do if I wanna be out of school in the next 100 years.
Until next time,
Cole

 here's a video of the swim start and exit... big field.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbWh870QoWA

I'd like to throw out a huge thank you to my sponsors and supporters, without help I wouldn't be where I am now. The all white custom Cyfac was a power horse as always, unreal power transfer, made life easy peasy lemon squeezy :) Assistance from ThinkMindShift helps me train hard and not have to sweat the details. Support from Trigeeks, Blueseventy, Leonard Hill, Anthony King and lets not forget my parents lets me get that much further ahead. Thanks!



*1-not an actual source :p I try and be funny sometimes

side note. cool info on nutrition shared by alex coates  c.heck it out

Some thoughts on food (or food for thought)

Was doing some reading and came across this article. Food is usually on my mind so I found this very interesting. Take is with a grain of salt. Hope you find it to be a good read despite it's length.
http://www.second-opinions.co.uk/taubes.html

Team TT and some action!

Training is going great and the spirits here are high despite some fatigue all around I'm sure. We are having to say goodbye to a few of the guys and gals who have to leave training paradise here in Clermont. They will be sorely missed as there contributions were all positive. 

The last bit of training has been great with some good work in the pool, in the saddle and in the sneakers. The Team TT was an awesome workout for everyone from what I could tell. It gave everyone an exciting little race to give our adrenaline addictions a fix. Teams were made the day before based on ranking the times etc. We were also given the opportunity to take off 5, 15 or 30 seconds (divided by the number of members on the TT team) from our TT time, based off how fast we chose to swim the two sets of 12x100's. This added a little fun into the mix and made the swim a bit faster too (awesome idea CT!)  

The teams were given a time, which was derived from the average of the team members previous TT times. The goal was to smash this time by as much as you could now that you were working with the others around your speed. In order of time improvement (total time improvement divided by # of riders in the team)... including swim time bonus

                                                       

1.  Team International/Gryffindor (Christin, Wilson, Stewart) 0:58" 

2.  Team BC/Ravenclaw (Sharpe, Powell, Foreman, Thomas) 0:45"

3.  Team ON1/Slytherin (Jamnicky, Quick, Lokody) 0:43"

4.  Team ON2/Hufflepuff (Donald, Hinton, Woodfine, Vierula, Brown, Bredschnieder) 0:37"

avg speeds

1. 42.4 km/hr

2.  39.2 km/hr

3.  34.8 km/hr

4.  40.2 km/hr 

Pictures and data courtesy of coach Craig Taylor, huge props! 

Times and data -

Pics from the swim - 

Pic from the ride -

Team international/Gryffindor ready to crush! (all business ;) ) -

sunshine

It's been a few good days of training, got the team time trail tomorrow. Jason, Marc and I are looking to crush. Should be fun!


heres pic from the run at "the grove" today!

Clermont - Bike TT result

The course was a sunny, moderately windy, and hilly 17.8km loop. Thanks to the great coaching staff we have here with us, everyone was well looked after and it was a safe and fun practice. Courtesy of the great coach Craig Taylor of the RTC Guelph (and Jason Wilson's powertap) here are the times*

*everyone has put in a solid block of training so far and effort level was up to the athlete, just some cool data to look at!


- an interesting side note and comment relating to Simons Whitfield's post about a time standard for cycling not yet being instigated for World Cup entry. If you assume the we can keep up the pace for another 2.2km,  multiply the times by 12.36% (2.2km/17.8km-at pace) on this training effort. How many of our young canucks would make a WC standard? Our top time was by Marc-Antoine Christin with a TT time converting to 30mins 46secs for 20km TT. Looks like some strong fitness from everyone. Just a cool thought.
peace.

Day 2,3 and 4

It's safe to say that the training camp is well underway, it felt like I logged a 70.3/half-iron man in with the amount of training on day 2. Managed to get a good progressive workload in, along with a solid dose of sun and fun. This did however, come with a price and the fatigue onset is very noticeable. I've settled into the Value Place extended stay hotel with the rest of the BC boys and got the fridge stocked with food. Home base is well and good. It's only a 12 minute bike ride to the NTC (National Training Centre) and the roads are pretty smooth sailing. The weather couldn't be better, with blue skies and not too too hot, the training conditions are really comfortable. Today the whole gang of Canucks swarmed to the pool for a solid and steady short course yards swim during the cooler misty morning. The BC crew just got back from our late morning sunny run with enough time to relax and regenerate for the much anticipated 18km bike TimeTrial. Update on the outcome soon to come!
C.

Day 1 and arrival

Got in at 7.30pm Florida time on friday and met up with the crew for the ride into Clermont.  The Ontario was kind enough to  let me crash on the big comfy couch until the arrival of my fellow Victorians. Had a solid group ride with the crew and followed by a good solid run around the swamp. The weather's perfect and I 'm looking forward to a good hard day of work tomorrow with swim bike and run on the menu.

Clermont, Florida

On the morning of the 18th I'll be flying out to Clermont, Florida to meet up with the Ontario squad for a solid block of training in the sun. On the 5th of March is the Clermont ITU sprint triathlon Pan Am cup. This should be a good race after a solid block of training and I'm sure all the Canadian guys are stoked to crush it. While i'm down in Clermont I'll be posting updates on training and maybe some cool photo's if your lucky.
C.

Brazil FAST

Knowing the forth biggest television channel in the world is filming your race live for 20million people is pretty crazy. It didn't make it feel any less hard, if you were wondering. The travel to Brazil was a really cool experience for me and one that I know i'll remember, a big thanks to AP and Matt for that. The jungle and the whole country had a very pleasant vibe to it but brazil seemed a little less bit hospitable when both AP and Matt became extremely ill before the race. The 3 man team that would complete 3 super sprint triathlons on TV for canada took a major blow. Both men were hospitalized and managed to finish the swim leg of each race but were forced to pull out with vomiting during the race etc. My luck had been considerably better than Matt and AP's and I wasn't phased by any illness. So I did the race solo. The first race was really exciting, not knowing what's going to come about during the race. I took the first bit of the swim very conservatively and only sprinted during the end to grab about at 5 second lead on the men following me out of the water. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwxTWqzEgkU there is a link with some footage of the first race. Look for me at 51 secs and 1min.17secs!!! Then the bike. I rode hard and felt the affects of the heat just 3 laps into it, over paced it and got dropped, which was okay. Still stayed within reach for the first race heading onto the run, it was fast and hot, very hot. I can honestly say with the 100% humidity it was the hottest i've ever been while racing came in about 7th. I wasn't sure, was more concerned with grabbing my red polar-fleece blanket and soaking it in ice water to wear while i set up transition again. The second and third races became exponentially hard and I finished in the 8th place zone. ended up scoring 36 points with one guy finishing races for Canada so I guess i can't complain. Frustrating for AP and Matt but a good travel/race experience none the less. Until next time..
Cole

Misfortune in Vina Del Mar

    Just got back from the race site after disappointment at 6kms into the bike leg of my elite olympic distance debut. With the course riddled with glass next to the curb ( o and rocks and horse manure, don't forget those either) I was unfortunate enough to come upon 2 shards that took me out of the race. Had I been close to the wheel pit my race would have continued on probably still in the front pack (considering the lead established on chasepack 1), however I had just passed the transition site (and wheel pit) by about 1-1.5kms of a 5km loop. The rules of the race don't allow athletes to travel backwards on the course and so I would have had to ride 3.5-4kms on a flat carbon tubular rim = not an option (unless I wanted to break a $2000 wheel in the process). This is a very frustrating experience for me especially under these circumstances and the fact that I came 2nd out of the water with a group of 3 other athletes (Jenkins GBR - 5th, Wiltshire GBR - 6th and Varias ARG - 7th)  We were still with ahead of 10 or so other athletes in the first chase pack (later this merged and spread to a lead group of 10 going into T2). I got a great view of the run and bike from the sidelines and saw my fellow countrymen come through with some solid but somewhat difficult finishes (AP 17th and Matt V 21st, just missing the points cut) The race dynamic  presented a great opportunity with the strong British contingent present for the race. This made it less of running race, spreading out the feild (chase pack was 2.5mins - 3mins back going out of T2). From this race I learned the the swim leg is considerably easier than I had estimated (the water was choppy but pace was easy to maintain), speed through transition is crucial in order to maintain a strong lead out of the water and that bike fitness is weighted a lot heavier than in Jr. racing. Putting the flats behind me and getting on some training before the brazil FAST triathlon where the 3 amigos plan to crush some teams and cash in on the race. Until next time..
Peace

South American Tour

Quick update on the life and times of Cole Stewart. After a great early season prep and a nice holiday off my studies at UVic, I'll be heading to YVR on the 4th of January to meet up with AP and MattV on our trip down. First to Santiago Chile where we'll be racing the ITU Pan American Cup in Vina Del Mar (startlist link here - http://www.triathlon.org/events/start_list/2011_vina_del_mar_itu_triathlon_pan_american_cup/5765/ ). On the 12th the three amigos fly to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil for the Brazil Fast triathlon where we duke it out against 15 other men. Wish us luck!
peace