Émy’s triathlon career broke new ground last weekend when she took on her first World Triathlon Series (WTS) event in Edmonton. Here’s how her race unfolded…
GOAL A, GOAL B
“Last weekend, I raced my first WTS ( World Triathlon Series) and there were a lot of very fast athletes at the start line; nearly 20 Olympians. My A goal was to be within 8% of the winning, to be able to get points. My B goal was to have a good swim and be able to place well in the cycling peloton and maintain that good position.
“BRUTAL SWIM START”
As expected, the start was pretty brutal, and I found myself among the last to reach the first buoy. After a quick analysis of the situation I spotted a gap in the swimmers and I slowly managed to gain a few placed during the rest of the swim.
I left the water in not as good a position as I was hoping for, but after a good transition I got into the second chase pack on the bike. It only took us 4km before catching the chase peloton; that made us roughly 25 women in the peloton. The rest of the bike section went well and we arrive at T2 within 30s to the lead group made up of 9 women.
The second transition was rather difficult (I forgot to mention that it was under 10 degrees an
d we were wearing wet suits on the bikes!). AT T2 my frozen feet didn’t not want to get into my running shoes. Leaving the transition I find myself in the middle the pack but I am soon overtaken by several people. I finished 34th and am satisfied by my first shot at my biggest race ever.
RACE OBJECTIVES
I achieved my first objective and earned points. As far as the swim went, I didn’t achieve my objective, but very much so for the bike section.
NEXT STOP SALINAS!
It was an amazing experience to compete with athletes of this caliber. I feel very motivated and I literally can not wait for my next opportunity to race a WTS (which will be in 2017 as this was the last race of this season). Now it’s time to get back to training in preparation for Salinas, a World Cup race.”
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