My first season racing as a long course Professional is coming to a close. It has been a time of significant learning and improvements. I finished in the Top 10 at the Busselton Ironman and set PB’s across all distances including a 4.04 Half Ironman and 8:56 Ironman; not all the progress I hoped for but moving in the right direction.

After Christmas I worked on ‘race training’, with no intention of peaking for any event. I aimed for a solid two month block of speed work and lots of swimming.

To begin this program there was the Victorian Olympic Distance Champs at Sandringham where I swam reasonably but followed up with a despicable transition (T1), which put me into the fourth cycle pack. I worked hard on the bike with fellow new pro Richard Thompson. Together we caught the third pack, which was about a minute up the road. I then consolidated with a good run but had lost too much time in the swim/transition to finish anywhere near the front.

I undertook two further draft legal races but was still just off the pace in the swim leaving me in the second cycle pack out of T1 each time, then late in the season disaster struck. I was involved in a bike crash preventing me from training for 10 days and putting me out of the Geelong Half Ironman 70.3 event. I snapped my bike frame and took off lots of bark but was extremely lucky not to break any bones.

Recovering from this mishap I went on to Maryborough to race the Central Goldfields Triathlon after just two days back training. I had a solid first run entering T1 with Griffin, Halverson and Huggett. Unfortunately the 10 day pause in training caused my race to go backwards from here and I had nothing left for the bike and finished in fifth position.

The next week I raced the Victorian Sprint Distance champs at Sandringham together with 20 other Eltham Tri members. There was no Open Category so was allowed to race Age Group. I finished second behind a strong performance from Nick Conway who put too much time into me on the bike.  I hung on for second in my age group and fifth overall not too far behind race winner Kristian McCartney.

The first weekend of March, I raced the BRW triathlon with fellow team mates Stephen Hadley (also of Eltham Tri) and Brett Archibald. We faced off some pretty hot competition in this race. After a hard battle in which we pulled ourselves back into second place, Team Giant Pro finished an estimated 90 seconds ahead. To our surprise we were pronounced the winners (Steven Bradbury style) after team Giant Pro failed to finish with their baton / timing chip.

This was a great finish to a memorable first year as a pro. I am looking forward to working hard in the winter and to further improvements next season.

My immediate next challenge is that of becoming a father. My wife Tarryn and I have our first baby due next week (second week of March) and I can’t wait to embrace this magical moment.

A big thankyou once again to all my supporters, sponsors and coaches, who have assisted me in beginning to make the transition from age group athlete to professional. I am once again confident of significant improvement in 2010/11.