Starters Orders

Last season I made a successful comeback to Triathlon after seven years out of the sport. During that time I concentrated on cycling time-trials sports wise, whilst working on building a business as a personal trainer. I felt however that I had some unfinished business with the sport, and with the motivation to get stuck in again I started back up at the start of 2008, by June winning Tri247.com's Athlete Of The Month award.

http://www.tri247.com/article_3675.html

This season my big focus is Ironman Austria on July 5th, and so I worked towards that goal from the end of last season and right through the winter. This season I have raced in New Orleans, Barcelona and the UK as I build my form ready to hit Austria in peak condition. That more or less takes us up to now, and on Sunday (14th June) I took to the start of the Bala "National Middle Distance Champs". As the race forms part of my build up to Ironman Austria, it was a case of training up to and through the event, and having recently missed a weeks training due to a virus, it was very important that I kept the momentum going training wise. I therefore started knowing that I would feature at the sharp end of the race, but that I would not be firing on all cylinders. The hilly terrain was not particularly suited to me, though overall I was satisfied to finish in 3rd place - and so collect the bronze medal - in what at the end of the day was a National Championship.

The result was as follows.

1. Mark Stenning
2. Richard Hunt
3. Craig Twigg
4. Richard Jones
5. Mark Couldwell

As this is the first post on my blog, I would like to take the opportunity to thank all of my sponsors. All assistance helps, and all the small differences when added together can make a big one, so thanks go to Saltstick, Elagen Sport, Extreme Endurance, and Baker Jane Insurance for their support.

You can also follow me on the twitter via http://twitter.com/twiggstar although I also have a twitter feed directly to this site. The feed can give an insight into me and my training (aswell as seeing me joke around with my mates). Life as an athlete is great though it can be tough too, as you will see from my updates!

That's about it for now but I'll be back on a regular basis to let you know how things are going, so keep checking in. Cheers,

Twigg.