Quote of the week

"This is the good life"-TL

My new Home

I was only home in London for one week before it was time to return to Guelph. I moved into my new home on Monday, which is a relatively nice house when compared to most student housing, so I can't complain. Only problem is it is a little far from the university, and although the bus stop to the university is just a few metres away, I have no bus pass during the summer months so I resort to biking to swimming in the morning, which isn't very pleasant. During the summer months my roommates chose to live at home, so i will be all alone for the next few months, I'm not complaining, but if you talk to me in a few months I am sure my life will be like the plot from The Shinning. So we will see how this plays out.

I competed in a bike race last weekend in the pouring rain. Nothing big, just a 45 km road race/crit that I used to do when I was younger. I wanted to race cat 3, but you aren't allowed to compete in that division if you are racing on a one day permit, so I raced cat 4. My goal was to go in and just keep attacking in the hopes of forming a successful breakaway. I must have attacked 10 times, most of which were solo, but the pack just would not let anything go. It ended up coming down to a sprint. With 1 km to go I found myself in about 8th position. I just stayed there and let the lead out men keep the pace high. With 200m to go people stated sprinting, and I was forced to squeeze through 2 people to get to the front before I could unleash my sprint. As soon as I started sprinting I knew that the W was mine, as no one could match me. I have never won a bike race, and although it wasn't very competitive I am still pleased with the effort that I put in.

Training in Guelph has gone alright. With most people gearing up for racing down south in the next few weeks, I find myself doing most of my longer bike workouts alone. Just me and my ipod. It really sucks seeing everyone starting their race season already while I am sidelined due to a bad winter/spring. Oh well, you got to make the best of every situation, so while my season is delayed, I have taken the opportunity to become a stronger biker. Nothing like ridiculous hours in the saddle with terrible weather to keep you sane.

Springbank Road Race Podium

And as I write this it is snowing outside. Gotta love this weather, 25 degrees one week, snow another.

So until later,

CH

What up.

Well I have neglected this long enough, and now that I have nothing to do I might as well return to writing useless information on a site that nobody reads. A couple weeks ago, between countless hours in the library, I remembered that I had a blog. In an effort to rejuvenate my motivation to update this thing, I decided to give this site a complete overhaul. Sadly it didn't work.

The last few weeks have been really hectic with exams, training, and other miscellaneous things. I finished up exams on Friday, so I have officially made it through first year. It was tough to get motivated for exams, as countless hours were spent in the library when it was so nice outside, and all I wanted to do was train. So hopefully all that time spent at a desk paid off.

Since finishing my last exam I have returned to London. Wow is it ever nice to get out of res, sleep in your own bed, and not worry about running out of money on your meal plan. The bonus thing is that I am forced to eat healthier, and since the caf isn't a 5 min walk away, it means no more vending machine meals because I am to lazy to walk that far.

Training has been going really well, I am biking like crazy, and swimming and running are coming along. I decided to skip the first two ITU races, Monterrey and Ixtapa because I felt that I could not meet my own standards, one because Monterrey was right during exams, and two because I hurt my ankle a month ago and that put me off running for a while. My first race will be in Milton on June 6. Milton is my favourite race. Although the frigid waters are usually a deterrent to most in early June, I just can't pass up the opportunity to race on one of the hardest courses in Ontario. 5 km into the bike you climb the escarpment, then 25 km of rolling hills. As soon as you begin the run your have to climb an incredibly steep hill, and the next 7km is never flat. During my early years it was always my first tri of the season, but the last few years I have been forced to skip it as more important races were on the agenda. So it will be nice to get back to my roots.

Now some bad news. Since October, a group of people have been striving to be the best, and last week their dreams were crushed by a little boy with a whisper stache. Yes, I am talking about the Ottawa Senators. Another year, another crushing defeat. One day it will be our time, just not this year,

So thats it for now, hopefully the next time I update it won't be months from now. Here is a commercial for the Canadian Athletes Now Fund that does a good job of summing up everything an athlete has to go through in order to support them selves financially. Enjoy;

So until later,

CH

Stress relief

6 weeks down, 6 to go. If I can make it through the next week with out having a nervous breakdown and ripping the hair out of my head, then I should be fine. School isn't all that hard really, just do the work and you will be fine. Only problem is work just piles up and before you know it you are swamped. I don't know how some of the other students deal with the stress, but as I sit in class I can see the students on their laptops playing farmville on facebook (man I miss farmville, but this is exactly why I got rid of it), or watching videos. One of my towermates likes to play Supermario. He is going for all 120 stars.

I guess that some students have farmville, others Supermario. It got me thinking, what can I do to relieve the stress of school, then it hit me as I was right about to go for a run. I train. It might not be as productive as harvesting your crops or raking leaves from your neighbour's farm (get farmville on facebook to know what I am talking about), but it gets the job done.

Since my last post I have moved on from Scrubs to another medical show, House. Although I haven't had much time to watch it because I have been so busy with school.

So until later, probably after midterms

CH

Back to School

I have been back at school for 3 weeks now. I only missed a few days of school from being in Australia, but those few days add up. It took me over a week before I had all of my textbooks and other reading material, and another few days before I was caught up on my readings. Having not been at school for over half a year, I had developed a rather slack work ethic, but I am back on track now. I am majoring in Human Kinetics, so I am taking lots of science and math courses, which will make for a hard semester, but I am only taking 4 courses instead of 5, so that lightens the workload quite a bit.

I am still on my down time right now. The rest of the gang started up last week, but I am taking until after Thanksgiving off. Since I have a lot of free time, I have been watching Scrubs. Here is one of their better clips.

So until later,

CH

World's Race Report

Well it is 4am, and I can`t sleep. I am talking to Yorke on msn right now, he is in the same boat. The 14 hour time difference is really killing me, now back to the race.

Leading up to the race I was pretty nervous. Because we raced on the last day, there was a lot of time between the u23`s and our race for the nerves to gather. Usually there aren`t any signs of nerves until the pre race meeting, but watching the u23`s seemed to bring them out, and the pre race meeting later that night only brought them out more. The one thing that seemed to make them go away was the elite mens race. Just watching it seemed to ease the tension.

We raced at 1:15 on Sunday, which is unusual for the juniors. The only race that I have ever done that late was Lubbock back in April, and that didnt go so well (puking on the run due to poor nutritional). Race morning I got up and went for a run, took a shower and shaved down, then I had a modest breakfast. There wasn`t a lot of talking going on with me, which usually happens before a race. To kill time I downloaded some new music, which really helped.

We left the hotel at 11:15ish to ride over to the race site. Yorke watched our bags while we rode along the spit. Got to the race site, checked in, did a short run, and a nice long warmup in the pool. I felt great the whole warm up, and absolutely amazing during the swim. After I finished my warmup I headed down to the beach to get in a few starts, but by the time I got down there they had already started marshalling everyone, so I had to can that. Usually I am a nervous wreck in the final 30 minutes before the race, but I was more excited than nervous this time. Some thanks has to go out to Tyler Bredshneider for that. Remember earlier when I said that I downloaded some music that morning, well I remembered Tyler talking about the movie Any Given Sumday, and Al Pacino`s pre game speech played a small part in what allowed me to cross the line between partial nervous breakdown, and excited to kick some ass.

I was number 7 going in, so I was pretty close to the end, but that meant that I had a long time after being called to visualize about my race. Sharon, and Craig have this saying, just think about the first 10 strokes, dont think about anything else, and that really helped. The horn blasted, and I just killed the first 10 strokes. By that time I had put everyone at my hip, and over the next few hundred metres I just kept distancing myself from them. I was tied for 1st to the first bouy, and myself and the other guy swam the next few hundred metres side by side. Rounding the final bouy I started to pick the pace up and moved into the lead for good. In the final hundred metres I pushed it a little more so that I could lead out, which i did. So the part of the race that terrified me the most was now over, and couldn`t have gone any better.

I had a smooth transition and headed out onto the bike. I rode solo for probably the first 500m before the pack caught me. Brownlee really wanted to stay away, and of the eight of us, only about 5 of us were doing work in the first few km, so i decided to let everyone else wrk while i sat in . It was not that I didnt have the strenght to pull through, I atually felt great on the bike. It is more that I was just content with saving my legs and not wanting help someone I knew was a really fast runner distance himself from everyone else on the bike. I took a few pulls a lap, but I wasnt going to be working my tail off with 4 other people just sitting at the back, so I decided to be one of those people. Sure, if I had worked really hard, we could have stayed away, and maybe that 20 second lead we started the bike with may have grown, or may not have. I am still confident that I made the right decision. We stayed away for 2.5 laps before a pack of 15-20 caught us, and after that I didnt go to the front. I just stayed in the top 10 to keep safe. On the final straight away everyone was crushing it to make it to the front, including me. Making the final corner into transition I was sitting in about 5th, which was perfect.

I had a clean dismount, but my bike pedals kept spinning, so my shoe kept hitting the ground causing my bike to skip, so I had to carry it for a few steps so the pedals would stop turning. I had a smooth T2 and headed onto the run in third. My race plan is always to build the run, so start controlled and pick guys off during the second half. I felt really good the first km. A few guys had run through me, but I felt that I had gone out steady and had enough left to crank the second half. I finished the first loop and was in about 8th. A few hundred metres into the second lap a group of guys caught me, and I didnt have that extra gear to go with them. I tried, but after 500m I dropped off. At the turnaround I tried again to pick it up, but it still wasn`t there. With about 500m to go there is a hill, and I gave it everything I had to catch the group in front of me, but by the time the hill was finished I was still off the back and was totally spent. There wasnt much left in the tank for a sprint finish, so I stayed in the same place, 12th.

Overall this was the best race I have ever had. I felt great the entire race, and although I didnt have that extra gear that I know is there, it was still my best race. All of the Canadian Juniors had great races. Some may tell you other wise, but few people come to world`s their first year and rock it. It is all one big learning experience, and they all did better than i did my first trip here. Alison Hooper, in her first year of triathlon was 6th, 6th!!!!!!!!, Kyla Caotes was 8th!!!!!!, and Rachel Edwards was 31. Matt Sharpe was 26, and Ian Donald was 42 despite having a stellar run. I wish they would schedule the Jr. women on a different day because I have never actually seen it. I only see about a minute of it because I am always focused on my race.

So Australia was a blast, I had a great time hanging out with everyone, now if only I could get back to my regular sleeping pattern.

So until later,

CH

Australia Update

We left Victoria Thursday night, and after the 12 minute flight to Vancouver, we boarded our 15hr Air Canada flight to the land down under. When we arrived we had to pass quarentine, which was a hassle. They have sniffing dogs everywhere to smell out food. One found me because I had had a turkey sandwich in there at the Vancouver airport. The lady searched my entire bag top to bottom, and when she found nothing, she still insisted that I had something in there, so she searched it again. The whole time I am telling here that I had fruit and a turkey sandwich in there 15 hours ago. Finally she let me go stating that it must have been the remanents of that turkey sandwich.

After quarantine is when the real fun began. We were supposed to fly from Sydney to Brisbane at 10am, but we didnt make that flight, so the group was booked over three flights. Lucky me, I ended up on the last one at 4pm, so I was stuck with a handfull of others in the Sydney airport for 6 hours after a day of travelling. The only good thing that came out of that was some very fierce games involving a tennis ball. This included hurling it as hard a we could trying score between the oposing team, target practice, volleyball, and cricket. The airport people finally pulled the plug on us at cricket when we were hitting the ball a ways through the terminal. That killed a few hours, although it did leave everyone who played with very sore shoulders for the next few days. We finally made it to our hotel at 7:30pm, where upon i went to bed and was k'od for the next 12 hours.

Training has steadily been getting better. It takes a while to recover after a day and a half of travelling, but the legs/arms are starting to come around. I have had some effortless sessions in the pool, and my legs are starting to get that spring back in them.

Yesturday we went to a protected park for a run. We saw a few kangaroos and wallabies, but we didn't see any koala bears, and we were looking. A couple people almost took a spill because they were running while looking up at he trees.

Today is the U23 race, which officially marks the beginning of the World Championships.

So until later,
CH

Londoner off to Oz

Connor Hammond heads to Australia for junior worlds after winning two silver medals in P.E.I.

For full article click here

Victoria

So I have been out in Victoria since last Wednesday for a Pre Worlds training camp. It is nice to be back, although I was only here for a month last year, I missed it. I don't know if I could see myself living here all year, being in Vancouver last year turned me off the whole living in a place where they get no snow, but get a whole lot of rain. I am homestaying with Matt Sharpe, his mom Barb, and fellow PTC'er Ian D. They live about a mintue walk from Commonwealth pool, which is nice in the morning.

I have done a little tour around town, refreshing my memory of Victoria. I had breakfast at Lady Marmilade'sthis morning with ian, yorkey, and Jairus. Lady Marmilade's is this little restaurant below my apartment last year that has the best french toast, which everyone got, and it is still as good as I remember. Craig took us on part of the waterfront loop, and I have done a lot of riding around the observatory, which was still quite fresh in my memory.

Training has been alright. My hamstring has steadily been getting better, and I have more power on the bike and run due to that. My body was a little shelled from a track workout that we did last week. It is not that it was a tough workout, more the fact that I did it 2 hours after landing in Victoria after a 5hr flight. I have been doing most of my workouts with Pat Kelly's group, with the National Team guys joining in on a few of the workouts. Today was one of those days where they joined in. We did 3X(2X Broadmead loop[a hilly 4.5km loop]) round one was tempo, and rounds 2,3 were building to race pace. That pace is all relative becasue it was geared towards the National Team guys. Rd 1 I was pulling my share, even though some of the hills were done as all out sprints. Rd 2 I pulled twice, once in the first 30 seconds, and once in the last 30 seconds. Rd 3 I just hung on the back for dear life. The problem was that they would climb the hills so hard that I would need time to recover, on the flats I was fine, but if I pulled on the flats I would have been fatigued going into the hills, which would have resutled in me being dropped. So I decided to play it safe and hang on for dear life on the hills. After the bike we had a 3ish km hard run on trails. My legs were pretty fried, but I still managed to post a good time.

I am only in Victoria until Thursday, I wish there was more time, but with Australia creeping ever so close, its almost time to hop on a 15 hour flight to down under.

So until later,

CH

Greatest Blog Ever

Click here for your viewing pleasure.

So until later,

CH