I had a solid all round day finishing in 6th place in a fantastic field. The Auckland weather was at it's absolute best with clear blue skies and little wind. I had a good swim to exit in the 3rd bunch 1:10 down on the leaders. On the bike there was a big group of 12 riders followed by our group of around 10 athletes, we couldn't make any inroads to the men in front as we headed over the Auckland harbour bridge and then up the Northern motorway. By the time we got back to the waterfront Andrew Yoder from the USA had made a charge to the front and was now leading the race with a good break on every one else. The two laps along the Auckland waterfront is just fast and dead flat, we ended up loosing another 20seconds to the group and it was now going to end up a running race to see who would win.
I started the run in around 14th place but was feeling good and had some good company to run with in Aussies Craig Alexander and Tim Reed. We started catching the guys in front and I moved into 5th with 5km to go but had Tim sticking right on my shoulder. In the end we ran out of road trying to catch the 4 athletes in front but closed the gap to finish just 36seconds down on 3rd with Tim out sprinting me for 5th.
My form feels great and I now have 6 weeks until Ironman New Zealand on March 1st so I'm looking forward to the next few weeks of Ironman preparation which will include some long hours of training! I'll be in touch soon.
Results:
Asia-Pacific Ironman 70.3 Championships Results, 2km swim, 90km bike, 21km run
FRODENO, Jan
Germany 21:43 2:09:45 1:11:59 3:45:40 1
CUNNINGHAM, Richie
United States 22:17 2:09:43 1:13:30 3:47:22 2
BOZZONE, Terenzo
New Zealand 22:13 2:09:19 1:14:04 3:47:33 3
DOCHERTY, Bevan
New Zealand 22:10 2:09:34 1:14:05 3:47:44 4
REED, Tim
Australia 22:53 2:10:33 1:12:35 3:48:05 5
BROWN, Cameron
New Zealand 22:56 2:10:26 1:12:43 3:48:09 6
ALEXANDER, Craig
Australia 22:46 2:10:42 1:13:05 3:48:34 7
POLSON, John
Australia 22:53 2:10:42 1:13:08 3:48:52 8
KEMP, Christian
Australia 22:16 02:09:15 1:16:49 3:50:30 9
O'GRADY, Graham
New Zealand 21:46 2:10:01 1:17:27 3:51:16 10