We got a lovely long ride in today over the back mountains of Santa Monica. The riding here in Los Angeles is absolutely beautiful. Lance Armstrong based here for the last of his 3 Tour De France wins in the winter and I can see why.The riding is absolutely stunning and today we enjoyed a beautiful 100 mile ride over these mountains. I enjoy this riding and we snapped a few shots today. On the way home we stopped for lunch in Malibu and I grabbed one of the protein Vegi Burgers  from the Malibu Cafe we stop at regularly. I have attached a few of the photos Paul snapped today including our Malibu lunch stop about 80 miles into the ride. He is a nut case and always fun to train with. He is as tough as nails and great training partner and super athlete himself.  He climbs these mountains really well because he is so light and keeps me honest. Tomorrow we have a big ride planned in the mountains again. I hope the day is as nice as it was today. It was great. We got back and Paul Ambrose and I did our first track running session for the year. That was tough. I am sore now and getting ready for bed. We have an early start tomorrow and a big day. The picture I have included here is from the top of Latiggo Climb in Santa Monica looking west to the water. From the Beach road, the climb to the top is 20km and it is awesome. This is a great climb to do for anyone who is in the LA area. Head north up the Pacific coast Hawaii towards Malibu beach and take the right hand canyon into the mountains. You will pass the beautiful home of Axel Rose, former lead singer of Guns and Roses on the way up and the actual climb is not too steep. Well worth it, especially on a nice day like today. The photos are good but don’t do these mountains north of Los Angeles justice.

We arrived back to LA on the early flight out of Miami today. I got a really good run in this morning with a crew of runners out on South Beach and was on the aeroplane back to LA by 11am. The flight from Miami to Los Angeles is about 5 hours and I settled in and got some work done on the plane. We had a nice evening last night on the Kswiss yacht and toured around Miami harbour and inlets.  It was really nice and a great crew of people. It was good to get home to LA though and in a perfect world I would have left straight after the event yesterday. We had to get some sponsorship things done in Florida that were one of the main reason for us coming to the event in the first place, that chewed up most of saturday afternoon. Miami was nice but at this time of year and with Ironman about 11 weeks away it is important to tie weeks of consistent work together. These races are great for the hitout but it is managing your workloads post smaller events such as this that can sometimes get out of hand. I am always cautious at this time of year with missing mileage and not laying enough volume to carry me through to Kona in October. I made this error earlier in my career when I first started racing in Kona and chased speed early season at the expense of volume. Anyway it worked out in the end and I was able to get my 2 hour run in this morning before flying out.  The weather was perfect in California and I spent the afternoon on the beach with my family upon getting home. I managed to sneak a swim in and then settled in to be back in the pool tomorrow morning for a big session.  The mileage is done and the preparation for Frankfurt on a base level is about 90 percent done. I am looking forward to adding some intensity work to the program and building the power through the next couple of events. I really want to have a solid hit out over the shorter distance in Columbia against Matty Reid. He is really racing well and with 5 weeks to put some intensity in on both bike and run I look forward to the tough race. I respond very well to intensity work but need to be careful with my weight at this early stage of the season. I can strip up very easily off lots of high intensity training and we are always cautious about holding some weight through our July Ironman. We have a busy week this week training so it is good to be home. I attached the picture from Redondo Beach so you can get an idea of how nice it was to get back home with my family to the beach. Anyway that trip is behind me, my first race of the season is done and now back to training tomorrow to step up the intensity and volume a little.

Well, I have just finished my first race of the season. I competed in the Nautica Miami International Triathlon which was a 2/3 Olympic distance race here on South Beach. South Beach is an amazing place to be especially early on a sunday morning. This is a party town and as we were getting up to go down to the beach to start our race, the clubs and streets were still packed with party goers from the saturday evening. It had a really great ambience and is a really happening town.

I was prepared to not have much speed but was looking for a race in warm weather where I could really hit the engine hard and try to blow out the cobwebs to begin the season. I like to look for short events at this time of year as the base work leaves you a little flat and a good hard short hit out is always nice. The race went well but not great. I exited the water in 2nd position and felt great in the swim. It was a solid swim pace with a few of the ITU boys really pushing the swim section. I was very comfortable and the swimming I have been doing in LA has really given me some solid strength. I look forward to adding some intensity come May to my swim program to develop a great swim for Ironman Germany. Onto the bike I felt strong but lacked a lot of power.

I simply did not have the power and the anaerobic engine to put out the high watts for such a short period.

I was really disapointed with my bike today and lost about 2 minutes to the two leaders Chris Lieto and Ben Collins. I usually ride with these guys comfortably but lacked torque and power. My Team had told me this week that I might not have the power on a flat course like this to hold the watts on the bike yet. I have been doing some big miles in the mountains on my road bike and have not been in the aero position this season. Riding hard on a TT bike is something that you need to train for and I had done nothing yet. I thought I would be able to muscle my way through the bike and hold the tempo, but the guys were too fast early and broke me on the sharp turns and the wide open sections. My Team were right and I was wrong.

My run was controlled and the fastest of the day

I thought I would be fine but my efficiency was down and my power was down. The bike was were I lost this race today. My run was controlled and the fastest of the day, but it was a little bit too little too late and I finishes about 1 minute from the win. Overall I was disappointed not to win but after speaking to my crew they have made me feel better. I had an email in my inbox from Mick that basically summed up the race before it happened. I spoke with him after the race and he said check your email. When I opened the email it was exactly as he predicted. I guess these guys know me better than I give them credit for. Anyway that’s my race from Miami. I head back to LA tomorrow afternoon and have two more weeks of heavy mileage before the program shifts into more pre competition stuff. I will be racing Wildflower a little on the base phase side but expect more power here and will then look for my speed to come back for the race in Hawaii and UK and then obviously my assault on the Germans in early July. My season has begun and now the racing begins. I love the racing and love this time of year.