CHALLENGER SERIES - HOBART

TA Challenger Series Round 4 - Hobart

Well while the rest of the HERT members were enjoying the torrential rain and cold weather in Sydney, Niki Hale Ben and I went down to Sunny Hobart town for the 4th challenge series race to represent the HERT contingent.  What a gorgeous little place – Saturday was spent frolicking through the Salamanca markets on a picture perfect day and checking out the hills and various turning points on the bike course.  Went to bed early at our beautiful little B & B “the Barton Cottage” after eating at D’Angilo’s Italian – could be the best Pizza and Pasta in Hobart – Highly recommended.

Race day was sensational conditions - the cloud cover overnight had kept the warmth in, not a breath of air and water that looked like glass and surprisingly warm.  I loved every second of this race and would definitely tell everyone that it is a must on next year’s calendar.

SWIM

The swim felt short – which is good for me and I didn’t even think of Dory out of finding Nemo “just keep swimming” once.  To get out of the water there were some stairs similar to Canberra but without the aid of volunteers pulling you up.  I almost fell straight back in before latching onto the side rail – I could hear Ben laughing at me!

BIKE

The bike course was so much fun - really hilly and the 8 5kms laps flew past and I felt like I was passing heaps of girls.  There were so many turn around points but the down hills were long and fast.  Every time I went up the steep Wilmot hill I thought of dead horse gap and how much Tara would be smashing it on this course.

RUN

The run was 4 x 2.5 km flat loops this was my main goal for the day to post a 40min run split – 10mins per lap.  I had bought some racing flats the Asics Piranhas that Tarza wears and these things are so good no wonder Tarz can run so fast!  I missed the time by 1minute 12seconds but I gave it everything – Ben has a photo of me to prove it that I think will stay in the archives.  Ben was also a champion telling me how far ahead the next girl was in front of me and to go faster – I missed 2 girls at the end by a couple of seconds that I was chasing home and ran out of course that were not in my age group – Lucky!

Overall I came 18th and second in my age group – 1st was a good 5mins away so never really in contention there.  Happy to say that it should be enough points to qualify me for September without having to go to Perth – yippee!

Niki had a great race too especially considering she could hardly walk due to a foot injury – she ran the whole 10kms like the trooper she is to finish 12th in her age group and pick up some good points for qualifying for the worlds.

We finished the day with a few Tasmanian vinos and watching the Juniors (we cheered Tamas on), u23’s and Elites battle it out– they were flying round the short course – you got to see them every couple of minutes and the sprint finish between Courtney Atkinson and Dan Wilson was really exciting.  

	Name	Pos	Cat	Cat Pos	Time	Swim	Cycle	Run
1	Jenelle Weatherston	157	F30-34	2	2:21:40	24:57	1:15:30	41:12
2	Niki Hale	351	F35-39	12	2:51:06	28:28	1:29:53	52:43

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