Triathlon World Champs 2009 - Gold Coast, Brisbane, Australia

We arrived on the Gold Coast on 09/09/09 and were really pleased with our self-catering apartment which had a nice view of the sea! We were based about 4kms from the event, which meant a lot of to-ing and fro-ing over the next 5 days.

The Nelson contingent at the Parade of Nations, missing Suzie, Gary and Glenn though - it was hard to get everyone together especially as the event was split over 2 days. We sadly didn't manage a team dinner, which was a highlight of the Wellington race earlier in the year.

12/09/09 Standard Distance Triathlon (Bernie's race)

Running start into the water - 1.5km swim ahead of us! Bernie is second woman in from the left.

Not easy to spot, and even harder when it's in motion, but Bernie is in the centre of the photo heading to the left with a white helmet on her 40km cycle.

And coming in to finish the 10km run, hooray!!

Finished in 2:38:04 - disappointing swim and run times, but still a personal best, which is worth celebrating. We met up with Natalie and Glenn who were our neighbours on Hackney Road in London. Great to see them again!

13/09/09 Sprint Distance Triathlon (Chris's race)

Getting ready to swim 750m...

Looking strong after the swim and over to his bike to cycle 20kms....

Couldn't get a decent photo of Chris on his bike, he was way too fast! Coming into the transition to the run, Chris is looking really good...

Heading out of transition and into the 5km run, Jon (our coach) overtakes Chris on the bridge...

And coming in for a sprint finish is Chris Whitaker of New Zealand, go Kiwi go!! Chris did a great time of 1:07:27 and is now ranked 187th in the world - in his first year of triathlon, that's a fantastic start!

Got the medal and in recovery mode...

Here's the Nelson team with Gary and Suzie, but missing Glenn and Colin, Sunday evening after the sprint event. Sadly no gold, silver or bronze in our group, but only narrowly missed by Suzie who came 5th, Jon 6th and Murray 6th in their age groups.

Back in Nelson on Tuesday 15th September and off to England today, phew! 3.5 weeks of partying, here we come!

Gold Coast

We're finally in Australia... nearly 5 months of training, a whole day travelling with 2 bikes and enough luggage for a family of Nigerians (no offence meant friends!) and worries of a 35 degree heatwave! Fortunately the climate is cooler - high twenties, and the beaches, sea, race course etc are stunning.

We've swum in the sea, albeit behind shark-proof-netting! The only fish we saw were puffer-fish so all our limbs are still firmly attached! We've continued training since arriving in order to get used to the heat - fortunately we're both enjoying the relative cool for this time of year!

We cant wait to finish the races as we haven't drunk in 6 weeks... not that we're counting! We will be devouring a few drinks on Sunday night at the event after-party, a big Aussie BBQ event at the festival village!

In preparation for the event we have been absorbing some of the speediest animals in the country - the might kangaroo...

Yes! At the supermarket we found 100% Kanga Bangas! We ate these for lunch today, and have 2 prime kangaroo steaks sat in the fridge for this evening!! Hopefully, we'll be hopping over the opposition on race day!

If you go to the triathlon website http://www.triathlon.org/multimedia/livecoverage/ you'll see how you can watch live coverage of our race online. It doesn't mention payment so hopefully you guys will be able to watch it for free. Bernie starts at about 8:20pm Friday night and me 8:20pm Saturday night UK time. Below is a picture of the event area before it was developed:

Last night we had the Parade of Nations which was good fun. We marched to the festival event area and us Kiwi males performed and impromptu Haka! This was hard for me as I missed the practice! I positioned myself at the back and copied everybody else - it was really well received and the only other performance was by a bunch of Aborigines who did old tribal songs which were really interesting to watch. I cant find it on youtube yet... hopefully I'll get some pictures together soon.

Love to you all!

Miles of Smiles,

C&B! x x