New Zealand World Triathlon Championships

At the commencement of the 2011-12 season, our sprinters made a converted effort to qualify for New Zealand. Alot of this came of the back of the success of China Worlds 2011 where Sean Smee came 3rd in age and Ken Murley 2nd.

Nothing like some success, and such a beautiful place to visit.

Hard graft over Winter, training in tandem within their Hawaii Ironman team mates saw a new style of training, which the guys really responded to. It was so exciting as a coach to try different things, think outside of the square with strong athletes like this.
Come Auckland last Sunday, they were all ready to race.

Ken Murley - World Sprint Champion 2012

To see Ken Murley win the World title in 65-69 was awesome. First time for me as a coach, super proud. Ken had a few injuries leading in, but as normal, when you put him in the race, he just switches on, had an awesome bike leg with the fastest split in his age, and then held on during the run, whilst nursing an injury.

Zoe and Cym - ready to race

Zoe Ferguson, super mum was next, coming 7th in 35-39. Zoe killed the bike, loving the technical course, with the 2nd fastest bike split, but just ran out of time to catch the girls before the finish. Zoe is going onto race IM Melb, look out girls.

Next we had Sean Smee. we knew the field would be a cracker in NZ, compared to China and Sean had really improved his speed. Sean came 12th in 30-34.  48th out of the water, Sean stormed into 12th with super strong riding and the 4th fastest run. Sean is going to concentrate on 70.3's for a while, so lot more time to catch up after the swim.

Paul Speed (Speedy), what can i say. 17th in 25-29, had an awesome swim. Speedy due to travel may not have been in the best shape, but he raced right up to his ability, a testament to his love of pushing himself and racing. Awesome.

Sean Smee on the bike

Stephen Hadley, he came to our squad for improvement after being self coached, and just loved training with Sean. Very evenly matched, Steve unfortunately tore a calf 2weeks prior to the race. No running till race day and couldnt drop his heel on the bike. Even with that, had a super swim, rode as fast as Sean, and still finished. Gutsy haddles.


All our team had a great experience and raced well. The loved it. We had 2 athletes race for Ireland, and representation for Great Britian, Netherlands, and of course the Aussies.
This has really set each of them up for great things in future races.


Team Results
Sprint

Pos	Cat Pos	Name	Time	Category	Gender	Swim	Cycle	Run
315	39	Rob Grummitt	01:14:34	3034	Male	00:12:58	00:33:49	00:21:03
665	1	Ken Murley	01:22:46	6569	Male	00:14:18	00:36:50	00:23:35

Olympic

Pos	Cat Pos	Name	Time	Category	Gender	Swim	Cycle	Run
53	12	Sean Smee	02:09:59	3034	Male	00:26:39	01:03:04	00:34:32
69	17	Paul Speed	02:10:38	2529	Male	00:22:50	01:04:07	00:37:52
184	34	Mark Duncan	02:16:13	3034	Male	00:26:43	01:03:16	00:39:39
274	50	Stephen Hadley	02:19:58	3034	Male	00:25:28	01:03:12	00:44:39
480	7	Zoe Ferguson	02:27:51	3539	Female	00:31:22	01:08:13	00:41:53
491	56	David Fitzsimons	02:28:10	4044	Male	00:36:12	01:07:40	00:37:58
888	45	Aine O Connor	02:43:16	3034	Female	00:36:10	01:16:05	00:43:56
1065	97	Joost Van Vliet	02:50:51	3539	Male	00:50:54	01:07:41	00:45:02
1178	79	Natalie Wong	02:57:59	3034	Female	00:35:56	01:24:07	00:49:10
956	56	Cyrma Hearn	02:46:12	3539	Female	00:37:27	01:16:51	00:43:54

Some of the team

Well done

Coach Foz (very proud)