Pati Manterola Follando

Ba'th loo'na

... and that's it. Also for me is the Triathlon season 2010 is now over. With the finish on the Challenge Barcelona on 3 October, I can close the symbolic folder of this year, and I look forward to a short exercise break.

Yes, Barcelona. Last year I had decided after a not very satisfactory Ironman Switzerland, on short notice, try to get me to even to this very challenge that took place was the first time. It was a race that I went to myself and from what I was, but despite a brilliant time not really end at the finish line, literally enchanted.

This year Barcelona for me was the "backup" in case something does not work in Copenhagen should - which then also arrived with a bang. Sun Barcelona was suddenly of the season and highlight in one ...

The feeling retract with the car in Pineda de Mar, in the same hotel as last year to check in the small but fine Expo in Calella, the transition area - very soon after my arrival, I realized that my all this had really been missing and that they alone have the joy of reunion, the trip was worth it. I can not describe the feeling and try and not reason.

Race day: swimming was okay, despite a much more troubled Sea than last year, I swam two minutes faster than 2009 - not quite what I would like in future, but - okay.

on the bike then the hangover - after a few miles I was due to my PowerBar completely überreitzten stomach so bad that I waited just concentrate on sharing my breakfast and about a liter of salt water from the swim of my cockpit . Anyone who has ever been located down with a stomach flu, knows exactly how it feels when one is so bad that you have vertigo (which makes the bike against the wind or for a certain adrenaline rush). One is paralyzed and would prefer to remain lying down and pray that it's over. In my case this meant that continue to pedal and wait for that my stomach a) either reassured or b) drains, which I would have been at times very welcome.

salt tablets, water and a little time actually helped, but already a new component came into play: the wind. Unlike last year blew the fine was concerned on the way to the first turning point of the front, which not only let me go slower, but (fortunately) all on the line. So I had to choose - go regularly and still can run or strangle and risk everything?

Option 1 seemed reasonable, because I can still like to have tried to depict a long-distance finish this year, so I went with a not very glamorous time in the second transition area.

The first run of four laps to me then too bad - until I was again so bad that I could barely see. The low point was reached when I on the way to Santa Susanna vorsagte also in the strong heat like a mantra: ten steps. Then you can stop. Another ten steps. And another ten ...

I did not last, and after a while it was again better. The last two laps I was able to run faster, and as I looked at kilometer 35 of the running track at my clock, I was exactly nine hours now. My goal of a sub-9 - finish was the client for this year then, but: I knew my final time of 9:29 last year. And slower than I wanted to be in any case ...

I managed to run the last 7.2 kilometers of the race in 27 minutes. After 9:27:43 hours, I crossed the finish line - 53 minutes before the second of my Agegroup. (About this result, I am going to miss another time - for now it was not bad to finish the season with my first podium finish at a long distance.)

in the next couple weeks, I probably this race a few times Revue can happen - for the moment I am happy that I have seen the goal and ended my season. I will definitely return next year in Barcelona at the start, be it back to the pro's or as Agegrouper - the race is so beautiful, so well organized and just great that I no longer want to miss. At least not in the next few years.

In this sense - you recovered well!

Sincerely,

Fabian

Is Carnation Breakfast Essentials Good For?

farewell tour

It's so far. In 2010, at least in sporting terms, approaching the end for me. A week from today will I already have a bag, pack, Fiat and Bikes in Spain - after a long and hopefully problem-free driving, I will once again be in Pineda de Mar on the lower end of the Costa Brava and at the top of the Costa de Maresme at the hotel.

My goal? The same as last year: the Challenge Barcelona, a triathlon over the full long distance.

this summer I had some before in sports - many things went well, the season's climax in Copenhagen, but unfortunately I had fond memories. Thanks to a technical fault I did not even see the finish line - a pity that the pretty race.

Thus the challenge remains for me in Barcelona as a further attempt retrieve my pro license. And what can I say? I am no friend of forecasts and the like. And why? If I have learned in my time on the long distance a little, so that that such a race is never routine. On the 226 miles can happen so very much, good and bad - but it can never be predicted.

I think a long distance triathlon has much in common with a climb up a high mountain: no one rushes to the summit, shouting to the world that one is up and running with fists raised back down. The mountain would take revenge - it takes respect. Respect for the power inherent in a mountain of respect for the mountain itself Sneak is high, thanks that you could do it - and sneaks down again before being noticed.

There is always something special to run across the finish line of a long distance. And I think that a little worse things can happen when you forget that this - that you lose the very essence of the triathlon, the actual thought behind it, about personal wishes, goals and misplaced ambition in mind.

If I can say at the end of this one way or the long, arduous and painful day: that was the maximum, everything today was not - then I will be satisfied. And the farewell tour for this eventful year enjoy it.

In this sense I wish you all a wonderful season - and those who have managed to conquer a spot in Hawaii, I wish all the best. Well, then - see you soon!

Sincerely,

Fabian

Yamaha Grizzly 600 Carburetor Florida

A short report

It happened again and again that things one had imagined in advance well, nice and colorful, go horribly wrong. The Copenhagen Challenge for me was such a thing. Well, three days after this experience, I am still wondering what exactly went wrong where, what ever happened - but I ahead of myself.

good nine months this year, I took time to get ready for my season highlight. Long units in the pool in winter, many hours in the gym, long endurance training in all weather conditions for walking and cycling ... the list is long. My form has been increasing steadily in recent weeks, the individual races that I, as a preparation for the big day-X "contest, went better and better, culminating in a start-to-wire victory at the Short-Distance in Zurich, that is a form of triathlon, which is not at all to me. Copenhagen was able to come.

The conditions surrounding the race were two things: fantastic and catastrophic. Fantastic organization, the volunteers, the atmosphere around the event - I have never experienced anything! Disastrous weather on the day before the race - rain and wind, as they no longer had in Copenhagen for 35 years. Or for fifty - the media were not in agreement. The transition area in ruins, and sometimes up to half a meter flooded, the team had their hands full, put everything back in order before were ready to make the 1,700 athletes nervous on Sunday morning their equipment. All this worked perfectly.

Then the swim start. The water at the Amager beach was quiet as a pond, a little wind blew from the north - I plunged into the water and felt the circling of the first buoy already pretty lonely. After about a kilometer we found ourselves in a group of three at the top - I still can not describe how sensational felt that. Literally for years I had been waiting for this moment: a long-distance race, the start of the swim course - be up front!

War I in my previous long-distance triathlons in phasing out of the water is always a little dizzy feel, so this Sunday was no trace of it - I could losdrücken from the beginning, as if there were no tomorrow. A quick sprint through the transition area, glasses, helmet to and from his bike Until then everything was fine ...

I had not a hundred yards back down on the bike, so closed, not even both shoes, I noticed that my front wheel felt unusually soft. Of the previously pumped into twelve o'clock bar no trace - and here at the start line no opportunity to get at! The shock went deep, and while I still bangs on the first bridge on Amager beach, I decided, if possible, to the first aid station at kilometer to drive thirty to patch where the front tire and move on.

So it was only once, to find your own rhythm, something to eat and then increase the tempo. I had my PowerBar bars yet half away as it hissed at me - the front wheel, my first thought was, of course!. But that should not be - it was my rear tire, which burst open, not even me after two kilometers of the bike course easy. Not a hundred yards was a Race Marshal, where I stopped. The front wheel had meanwhile also become noticeably softer - two flat feet I would not mend. What to do? roll on carbon rims, worth over four thousand francs over bad roads to the next aid station? While I myself over trying to deny everything, I realized that the race for me was over before it had even begun.

What had happened? My tires were in the morning in order. Maybe at night storm had plenty of sharp sand and shell fragments through the transition area and on the streets so flushed that I said this is the death blow - I can explain it to me otherwise.

for me to say it now: look ahead, go ahead and hopefully someday understand the meaning behind it all.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank all those who thought of that day to me and helped me. Here on the internet with names to throw me I will refrain from doing - those who are concerned to know this. Thank you in these bitter hours me being there.

Sincerely,

Fabian