Trinidad Coast to Coast

After a whole 2 days at home in Nelson after Motu it was back on the road, this time via aeroplane and off for to Trinidad for our third trip to the Tropical Power Coast to Coast. The flight to the Caribbean is not a short one and we broke up the trip with an overnight in LA. After having the best flight ever in economy class due to there being almost no people on the flight and having the luxury of a whole row of seats each to lie down it was back to the usual chaos as we checked in at LA only for the American Airlines computer system to crash and be out of operation for nearly an hour and a half. The only saving grace was that we were already at the front counter so when they did come back online we could avoid much of the pandemonium that must surely have followed.

We had a beautiful place to stay the night before the race in Toco on the north Coast of Trinidad where the race starts. I’m sure all of the internationals staying there would have been quite happy to forgo the race the next morning and chill out at the beach for the day – I certainly would have been. This year there were more internationals than ever before with athletes from Mexico, France, Canada, NZ, USA, Finland, Sweden, Germany and of course Trinidad. Being at the end of Trinidad’s rainy season it wasn’t too much of a surprise to hear torrential rain on the roof during the night and we were assured of ultra slippery roads and the notorious wooden bridges.

Day 1

The start is almost a carbon copy of the Coast in NZ with everyone haring off like it’s a 200m sprint before the reality of the day dawns on people and the pace becomes more subdued. After the short run it was onto the bikes and a small group of us quickly established a small lead. Neil Galletly from NZ, Martin Flinta from Sweden and a couple of local team riders along with myself jostled for position on the slippery roads. After the first tight corner the group had fractured with the two local riders and Martin having gone off the road and it was a while before they managed to rejoin. We stayed reasonably close for the next few km’s until Neil got his first of many punctures, Local rider Colin hit the deck around the same time and then I slipped away from Martin on the on major downhill and together with Linwood, the remaining local rider we kept the pace solid until the transition to the run. Surprisingly we’d managed to reel off the first ride in a new record time despite the rain and as I changed to running shoes I could see their team runner already disappearing across the field and into the Coastal Bush track. One thing I’ve really learnt over the years racing in the heat is you can’t afford to rush and miss fluid, food or the chance to cool down. Once you miss something it invariably comes back to bite you much harder than in a normal climate. I set off feeling good and with rain still falling it didn’t seem too hot just yet. The start of the run is a solid climb and I slowly reeled in the team runner and concentrated on running just fast enough to feel it but not so fast that I would cook myself. Within the first hour the rain had stopped and been replaced by a steam room like heat as the sun broke through. It is a nasty sort of heat that sucks your energy away and because of the near 100% humidity you don’t seem to sweat like in a dry heat and so it is almost like cooking inside your own skin. This year with the morning rain there were plenty of stream crossing to drink from and to cool off in and my routine for the next couple of hours was to run from stream to stream, at each one stopping to submerge as much of myself as possible, drink a little and carry on as fast as possible. This year the run had been lengthened due to several beaches being eroded to the point where they no longer existed at high tide, necessitating following a more inland track at one point. Owing to this when I arrived at the final beach after 2 hours and 7 minutes I thought I was well outside the time needed to make the finish in under 3 hours so was more than a little surprised when I found myself running across the bridge to the finish with 5 minutes in hand to go under 3 hours. Not that I was complaining, even though this had been easily the coolest day we’d had racing in 3 years in Trinidad the temperature was still well into the 30’s and the final 4 km on the road where completely exposed to the midday sun. I headed straight for the river and a cooling soak and then sat back to see how the rest of the field had faired on day 1. Martin Flinta was the second individual home, roughly 30 minutes down, followed by local champion Clarence Tobias and then Neil Gellatly. Elina led the women home with about a 15 minute buffer to Nina the German Mexican who’d had a great run. Most of the stories from the first day centred around the carnage on the first ride where the seal was in such bad condition it resembled a cyclo cross course more than a road course and with the slippery conditions, wooden bridges and a little too much bravado from some it had left a fairly heavy casualty list. Most had been able to continue but one of the teams favoured to win the teams title was out after the first corner when there cyclist went down and broke his collar bone.

Day 2

The locals seem to enjoy the fact the start is on rough roads, in the dark and with minimal lighting, I’m not so sure but that’s how it is. We were greeted to more rain in the morning and comparatively mild temperatures of around 25 degrees (at 5 am) The first stage of day 2 is a challenging 50km bike with 3 pretty major climbs. Thankfully after about 5 km of picking our way through potholes the surface improves dramatically and the remainder of the ride is far smoother than anything you would find in NZ. Our bunch took a lot longer to thin out today and I for one was short on motivation to do the attacking. Slowly we shed a few rider son each climb until the final climb we were down to our same 5 riders as day 1. Neil wasn’t having much luck and having made it through the rough stuff punctured on the smooth seal at the start of the climb, the rest of us stayed together until near the top when Linwood took a flyer off the front and by the time Martin decided he wanted to chase he was long gone. I had no intention of letting Martin go and so jumped on his wheel and Colin did likewise. We had soon settled back into a more sensible rhythm and it wasn’t long before we were hurtling down now dry roads towards the transition. Out momentum was briefly interrupted when we caught Linwood who had punctured, we stopped, I gave him a spare, Colin gave him a pump and we chased back up to Martin who’d slowed for us and we finished off the remaining Km’s. Onto the run and I gave Martin a good head start by taking a rather too leisurely transition. It took me half of the first asphalt climb to catch him and a lot longer to lose sight of him as we were slowed to a walk by the steep terrain. It was a relief to reach the top and to know there was no more uphill in the remaining course. The run down is a maze of jumbled roots and twisting paths which never seem to open out long enough to get a good pace going so it was nice to stretch out a bit on the final few km’s along the road to the beach. Arriving it was good to see a few waves to make it interesting, the north Coast section had a swell of close to 3 metres and I headed out away from shore to get a few of the bigger swells and hopefully to avoid having to paddle the whole way! As luck would have it the swells where pitching up nicely and a few hard paddle strokes was all it took to get some short but exhilarating rides. I reached the first Bocca which is the local term for a passage between the islands and left the north coast behind. The remainder of the paddle was into a strong tide and it was soon evident that it was going to take a lot longer than originally hoped for. As I headed for the final check point I could see a big squall approaching, the clouds in it were jet black and streaks of lightning flashed down periodically. I always get nervous paddling when there is lightning around, especially a few km out to sea but luckily by the time it hit it only contained wind and horizontal rain. Now with the finish in sight I rounded the final marker and got one last small downwind run in before coasting up to the finish. It’d been a day of self preservation more than anything, having raced Motu hard the weekend prior and a solid first day the motivation keep driving hard all the way to the finish had escaped me and I’d enjoyed having a bit more time to take in the course. Next in was Martin in the individuals, closely followed once again but Clarence, his paddling has really improved and  he’ll be a real threat to win the race outright within a year or two if he keeps improving at this rate. Elina had a solid day to again be first of the women home with Nina from Mexico followed in by Nina from Trinidad. This capped a great return for Nina (from T&T) who had been knocked off her bike before the race last year and had been very lucky to survive. Neil had a race to remember with punctures plaguing him in the bike sections and Kat succumbed to a stomach bug and pulled out on day 2 after finding no energy in the tank.

The following day we headed off for a few days R&R in beautiful Tobago, it was nice to finally be able to relax a bit. I couldn’t have a complete blob out as I have a race in Australia in under 2 weeks but the 30+ degree sea was a great place to do some long swim training. We also had some other good news with the securing of a sponsor for our team for the Abu Dhabi Adventure race in December. Unfortunately Aaron and Gordon have already been lost to other teams but it will give us the chance to try some new combinations and hopefully defend our title. The Sponsor is the TDIC in Abu Dhabi who are the development arm of the ADTA. We are hugely grateful for their support and are looking forward to returning to Abu Dhabi. We will be racing under the name Team Desert Islands.  HYPERLINK "http://www.abudhabiadventurerace.com" www.abudhabiadventurerace.com