<p>It’s been over 2 weeks since I raced Kellogs Nutri Grain Ironman New Zealand. I’ve spent the past week back in Australia and Sydney and Melbourne, catching up with friends and contacts and generally continuing to chase summer. It’s been manic but it’s been awesome. Visiting friends, my favourite places, body surfing with the gang [&hellip;]</p>

<p>I’m sitting looking out over the beautiful mountains surrounding Lake Wanaka. This time last week I had crossed the line at Challenge Wanaka, finishing second just over 3mins behind the winner Yvonne van Vlerken. This time next week I hope I will have also crossed the line, this time at Ironman New Zealand.</p>

<p>Flying into Sydney from Christchurch felt good. It was familiar. I’ve spent 7.5 years living in Sydney so have some strong ties and connections and it was good to land back on Australian soil, albeit for only an hour in Sydney airport before connecting on to Western Australia and Perth.</p>

<p>It’s taken a few days (ok weeks) to think about putting something down about the last few weeks/months and my last couple of races. To be honest, I’ve been in what I think is called a hole. Mentally more than physically, and it’s taken a lot of grumpiness, moping, and generally feeling sorry for myself, [&hellip;]</p>

<p>Today is brought to you by the number 3 and the letter A&#8230; for ARGHHHHHHH! So I was hoping for &#8216;third time lucky&#8217; with my race in Knoxville, but I guess it was the other saying of &#8216;things come in threes&#8217;? I headed to Challenge Knoxville off the back of two bad races. Completely unrelated issues [&hellip;]</p>

<p>I wasn&#8217;t going to write a race report of Oceanside 70.3. I wasn’t really sure what to say about the race, but after tossing the idea around and actually whilst I was out on a steady run on Sunday, I felt it was the right thing to do to just capture a few thoughts and [&hellip;]</p>

<p>What a month it has been! February you were fantastic! I’m now back in San Fran after a great few days in Sydney capping off a pretty awesome February. It was so good to back   Down Under catching up with friends, visiting favourite places and diving in that ocean at Bondi Beach. Sydney is [&hellip;]</p>

<p>Welcome to the Amusement Park and the Rollercoaster ride of an Ironman! This is how they should describe the entering and the lead up to an Ironman, even the race. The last few weeks I’ve gone through so many emotions. From head in the sand and complete denial that I was racing an Ironman, to unbelievable [&hellip;]</p>

<p>Having spent a week in Mont Tremblant in June with the Purplepatch crew at a training camp, I was keen to get back there. So when I found out I had managed to collect enough points from racing to make the cut for the World 70.3 Champs, I was pretty excited. Mont Tremblant is a [&hellip;]</p>

<p>Before any of you take your minds to the gutter….the dirty double is what Matt Dixon and the squad call back to back racing, one week apart. My first dirty double just happened…Vineman 70.3 backed up one week later with Racine 70.3. The only other time I raced one week apart was backing up Ironman [&hellip;]</p>

<p>Bonjour! Ok so that’s about as far as my French goes, without the risk of saying something unintentionally insulting. I’ve just spent the past week in Mont Tremblant, Quebec and wished I’d been able to remember more of my GCSE French! (To any kids reading this&#8230;pay attention in your language class!)</p>

<p>So I&#8217;m classing this as my first proper 70.3 as a Pro, and with a 4th place finish I’m pretty happy. The big positives are that I felt like I stuck to the plan and took some huge learning away from the race, and even bigger positives, that I know there is still a lot [&hellip;]</p>