2012 Season- Better late than never.

Hi all!


As you might be able to tell, the old social media hasn’t been our strong point to date – but, as we’ve said, all that is about to change – we promise! We said we’d keep you updated on the highs and lows of being an elite athlete, along with coaching stuff too but, partly because we were doing all that stuff, you can see that didn't exactly happen. 

Things will be different now – so keep in touch with what’s going on. 


To kick off with - what’s new since that last post?  I mean that post was in February, so there is a bit to tell! Here goes!

Firstly, all you athletes have been kicking butt! So, in no particular order (as they say!), let’s hear about some of the achievements……




Katie Cooke

-  Irish Middle Distance Champion

-  14th Overall Ironman Austria

Well done, Katie!


Leon Taylor (Olympic Diver and driventotri athlete)

-P.B. of 20 minutes at the London Triathlon

Fantastic effort, Leon – all heading in the right direction – quicker!


Joyce Wolfe

- Irish Ironman record holder.

- Gave birth to a bouncing baby at the end of May. Baby Cara was taken for her first swim two weeks later, both are now back in full training.

Wow! Women! How brilliant, Joyce! Hope you’re getting some sleep too, though!


Hannah Drewett

- Made her senior elite debut at Banyoles World Cup where she made front pack on the bike.

-  Led Olympic domestique, Lucy Hall out the water at Dunkirk French Grand Prix.

That’s so impressive, Hannah! Well done!

Sarah Davis

With the help of her training, lost 1.5st and looked fantastic in her wedding dress. 

Congratulations, Sarah!

Onto the coaches front. What they have been up to? Well ……

Harry just missed out on getting the third place in the Olympic team but, not to be deterred, quickly turned his attention to Ironman racing. Not that he was prepared enough for such a change in distance though, and although he managed to win the Outlaw, I think his run wasn’t what he would consider his best! Some would say not bad in the circumstances though – and a win’s a win! With this success though he thought that the same success might follow at Ironman Wales. Sadly, this wasn't the case and he realized that maybe some more appropriate preparation wouldn't go a miss! He’s on the case!

Non has had a fantastic season since moving to Leeds. A senior World Title in The Mixed Team Championships must be the highlight – racing in difficult weather conditions that saw a few others hitting the deck in places!  This came a day after coming a most credible 6th in the main race! Fantastic achievements! The girl doesn’t like rest though so, currently she is preparing for the World U23 champs in Auckland. Go for it, Non!

That's about it for now - unless you know differently - but we'll let you know what happens 'down under' as soon as we get the details, and anything else we think you'd be interested in hearing.


Wherever you are, whatever your goal – we’ll help and support you! Keep in touch and keep up all the good work!


So - Keep tri-ing! 

Driventotri

Happy Belated New Year...

Happy Belted New Year one and all.

OK so its February 6th. I'll put my hands up and take all the sticks and stones you can throw at me. Actually no, I take that back, sticks and stones may broke my bones...

Anyway, what I'm trying to say is, better late than never??!!
OK I guess it should actually be "sorry".

So finally 2012 is upon us and it's been a pretty busy start to the year here at Driven to Tri towers.

Harry has been somewhat errr...busy?! Yes busy. I'll spare you the details. But if you haven't the faintest what I'm chatting about you probably don't frequent 'TriTalk', or whichever gossip forum is cool with the kids these days. I recommend you keep it that way. You know you shouldn't believe everything you read...

Never the less it does mean we haven't had time to update the homepage with exciting events and general happenings for 2012. Again we do apologise.

But, fear not ever faithful driven to tri-ers, please keep your eyes peeled, we're hoping to address this within the next few weeks where we will shower you with glitter and gold...OK not quite but there's definitely something quite exciting in the pipeline. Well we think so anyway...

In general news, we would like to send our congratulations to Gethin, who recently proposed to Jo, who thankfully agreed, and the two are now blissfully engaged. On the same weekend Gethin ran a 1min45 PB over 5miles to clock 33.51. Did I mention 1min45 PB! Amazing what a successful proposal can do for your running. Best start cracking out the rings fellas...

I hope the rest of you are having an equally exciting start to the new year, that your visors are still safely stowed away, and you haven't had a warm gel since September; oh the joys of the off season!

Keep warm friends...the summer is just around the corner...I hope!!

Love and stuff x

PS: if you have a spare 5mins or are bored at work check out coach non's blog at; www.nonstanford.blogspot.com

Swim, Bike, Run and some Vitamin G just for fun...

How I ended up in Ireland...

Harry: Non you’re going to Ireland with Al and Jon.

Non: When?

Harry: This weekend...

Non: What for?

Harry: Charity, Driven to Tri, did I mention charity?!

And that was the end of that.

After Wales outed Ireland from the Rugby World Cup only a few days before, I was a little apprehensive about boarding a plane to Dublin, my welsh lilt in tow, brandishing the name Non Rhiannydd on my passport.

Lamb. Wolves. Yes I was thinking exactly the same thing. At least I didn’t have a baguette in my bag and go by the name of Henry.

But there was no turning back on my word now; it was all in the name of charity after all. Plus the lovely man on the phone kept mentioning some guys called Aston and Martin.

After being charged for everything other than breathing on board our ‘BrianAir’ flight, the fanfare we received on landing, informing us that we had somehow survived the 40minute journey from Leeds Bradford, did rise a smile and reassured me that, if anything, the Irish do have a bloody good sense of humour.

We were greeted by the man on the phone, and his lovely friend Aston Martin. So it turns out they weren’t two hunky Irish guys for my viewing pleasure, but the substitute was probably better. It looked good and sounded even better. This was closely followed by the first item on the weekend itinerary; a pint of the black stuff down the local.

My first Driven to Tri duties came on the Friday evening. An Open Water Masterclass with the Brownlee brothers. Apparently the name Brownlee incites a lot of excitement. In case you’ve been hiding for the last 12months they are the reigning World Champions, have pretty much cleaned up at every race they’ve toed the line at this year and are in general the current God’s of the triathlon world. So I guess it came as no surprise to have over 50 people through the pool door after advertising the session for less than 8 hours between the hours of 11pm and 7am.

Running through all the elements of a good open water swim, from starts to drafting, rounding buoys and the infamous ‘roll’, I lead the session from poolside while the boys got stuck in with our eager participants, demonstrating exactly how the pro’s do it. The session was a success. Everyone had fun, no one succumb to any licking or unnecessary touching of the Brownlee’s and I lost my voice trying to keep up with the Irish banter. Oh and most importantly a lot of money was raised for Temple St. Children’s hospital.

The next morning we were straight back on it for the weekend’s main event, The ‘Catch Me If You Can Brownlee Duathlon Challenge’. The concept; run and bike as fast as you can and hope that the handicapped Brownlee duo don’t catch you. Everyone failed. Even myself. In my defence I caught all the women who were given a 3minute lead on me. To my shame Alistair flew passed me 5km into the bike. He also covered the first 3km of the run in 8minutes 50. Off no training. Sometimes life just isn’t fair. Despite the Brownlee pasting however, the event was a huge success and again the dollar rolled in for Temple St.

Later that evening Al and Jon were honorary guests at the Triathlon Ireland Awards Dinner. We were promised an evening of “great craic”. That we certainly had. The ‘Vitamin G’ flowed freely, the compare offered 200euros to the first woman to show him a tattoo in an interesting place...I think the British Triathlon dinner is going to be somewhat of an anticlimax.

Details of the rest of the evening are probably not appropriate for this simple blog spot, but remember Driven to Tri-ers, old and new, if you fancy a master class in open water swimming, a weekend training like a pro, or if you think your club would be interested in a tailor made training camp give us a shout. We are here for all your triathlon needs. Well the majority. I draw the line at calf guard advice, aero helmet chat, and chub rub related issues. (Please note: Brownlee’s do not come as standard).

With love,

Yours truly

Non x

nonstanford@driventotri.com

from beijing with love...

from beijing with love...

So this much overdue team update comes all the way from Yokohama, Japan. It was meant to come a week earlier from Beijing, but apparently Chinese authorities do not trust the present driventotri blogger to abstain from uttering unspeakables such as ' free tibet', 'tiananmen square' and 'china is a shithole' within the context of its triathlon drivvle. Probably wise. China is a shithole.

So first up on the role of honour is Pete Thacker who contested Ironman Wales last weekend. According to the event tag line the race was held over a 'breathtaking landscape'. According to all reports this was very true. The course was bloody hard. Pete however, charged his way around in 13.09.39. A pretty stellar performance. Congratulations Pete.

Over the border, in the tropical metropolis that is England, Gethin Musk toed the start line of the Big Cow Sprint, finishing 11th in his age group in a time of 1.13.57. Well done Gethin.

A few miles further east, Driventotri coach Non was racing at the ITU World U23 Championships in Beijing and finished 6th. She was pleased that 2 weeks of heat acclimatisation in a 35'C / 70% humidity, heat chamber came in handy. It was cold and it rained. A lot. It's all very well living by the old adage of 'fail to prepare, prepare to fail', but when your preparation turns out to be pretty fruitless then one must assume the 'life's a bitch' mantra. Luckily 'expect the unexpected' is a also a favourite life lesson.

So as September roles out and winter begins to role in, the end of the triathlon season is upon us. Visors and calf guards can re assume their position at the back of the wardrobe, where they probably belong, and the fleece lined bib longs and thermal vests can work their way back into daily attire. To help kick start your training and banish the winter blues we will be running triathlon specific swim clinics throughout October and November. If you think this is something that your tri club would be interested in, please get in touch with Harry on harry@driventotri.com and we can discuss the particulars. We are also in the process of planning other training events and weekends and will let you more details as and when.

That's all for now

Driventotri Coaching team x

London Hyde Park

Hi all :) A quick update from this weekend at Hyde Park. If you weren't watching it was a pretty good day at the office for the British Elite with Helen Jenkins and Alistair Brownlee taking victory, and Jonny Brownlee pretty much swimming his way to 3rd and that all important Olympic qualification spot. It rained by the way. A lot.

More importantly Driven to Tri athletes were also having a good weekend. On the Saturday Gethin, Ian and Di raced over the Hyde Park Olympic course;

Gethin 2.23.03
Ian 2.54.32
Di 2.58.57

and were followed by Pete and Mark on Sunday who did battle with the Buckingham Palace loop;

Pete 2.30.36
Mark 3.02.44

In the Elite Women's race, new coach Non was 4th Brit home and got her first WCS finish in 39th.

The weekend also played host to the National Junior and Youth Aquathlon Champs. South West Academy and Driven to Tri Junior Hannah Drewett finished a pretty impressive 4th, taking 3mins off last years run time, while honorary Driven to Tri youth, Miles Burton stormed his way to the top of the podium to become the National Champion.

Harry and Pete watched well.

Congratulations to all :)

On the other side of the pond...not the serpentine...that bigger one more commonly referred to as the Atlantic...Jane was racing Ironman Regensburg in the 40-49 AG. And doing pretty well at it. Finishing time: 12hours 21!!

Keep up the good work team :)