Pete Jacobs and Lisa Marangon win triseries Olympic distance triathlon in Forster

The first round of Elite Energy’s triseries was completed today at Forster in perfect conditions with Pete Jacobs and Lisa Marangon taking out the Olympic distance race. Mitch Robins was 2nd and Adam Holborow was 3rd. Matilda Raynolds was 2nd in the women’s race after overtaking Nicole Ward (3rd) on the run. Top age groupers Robert Skillman and Matthew Koorey finished in the top ten.

Pete Jacobs  really enjoyed the hitout and raced very hard. He was determined to put in the fastest effort that he could. It was more about proving something to himself. Pete looks like he is in top condition and is just over a week away from heading off to Hawaii to hopefully go better than his 8th placing last year. He has a little bit more long bike work to do then he feels he will be fully ready. Read Pete’s race report.

Lisa Marangon  had a blast. Maybe that is easy to do when you win but this was genuine enjoyment. Lisa found one thing worse than anything else… the same thing that the rest of us discovered as we ran from the beach to our bikes “I found the hardest bit transition, that gravel on the feet. OUCH!”

“It was such a fun weekend. The bike was great! The course was awesome. I felt a bit flat from racing on the Saturday but still gave it all I had. My swim was great and I felt really fast (even swimming an extra 100m the wrong way). I didn’t have the power I normally have on the bike but still pushed as hard as I could. On the run I started off really fast and got a blister under my foot which really annoyed me and then my right glute tightened up. Overall I was happy and gained so much from it”.

All of the top finishers seemed to really enjoy their results and the whole weekend.

Mitch Robins  enjoyed racing at this distance as he ponders whether ITU is the way he should go right now “It was always going to be a fast race with Pete Jacobs competing as part of his lead up to the Hawaii Ironman, and also my buddy Adam Holborow. As expected, PJ led out of the water, with myself around 45seconds behind. I was stoked to still be within reach, as Jacobs is a fantastic swimmer. He was extremely strong all day and proceeded to ride another 2mins into me. I felt great on the bike though and wanted to put together a hard bike/run combo and really test myself out. I took off on the run still in 2nd place, and gave it all I had, but I was still a little jarred from the hard race the previous day. I extended my lead over the rest of the field, and finished off with a 33:03 min run split to finish in 2nd overall. Full credit to Jacobs, he was super classy today and looks on track to improve on his 8th place in Hawaii last year”

Mitch couldn’t have been happier with his weekend overall, with 2 hard races back to back. He will be racing more short course races this year. “Thanks to TriNSW for looking after the team all weekend, and a huge thanks to Emo and his Elite Energy crew for another fun and successful race”.

Adam Holborow  has been back training for only two weeks. He took a few minutes to give Trizone his thoughts on the race and how things went. “Emo (Mark Emerton from Elite Energy) really knows how to throw a good race. I still didn’t know if I was going to race until Saturday arvo. On Friday I rode from Port Macquarie down to Forster” which seemed to be a bad idea when Adam found out that he had a head wind the whole way down.

“I have been back training for 2 weeks now so I was really happy with the way the race went. Pete Jacobs and Mitch Robins were just flying. they are really good athletes. I had a great swim and came out with Mitch and Rob Hurley and once out of transition I got stuck into it. By the 13km mark on the bike I had a lead over the boys and I was trying to catch Pete. As I came through to go back out to do my second lap the guys from the NSW EDS team gave me a time split and I felt pretty good. On the way back out to the turnaround something came loose on my disc wheel and was making a really bad noise. As I was riding I was trying to figure out what it was. Coming into T2 I was feeling good and was in 3rd place. On to the run I felt the effects of Friday and the first 3km I was really struggling but I came good and finished strong. I have a lot of racing coming up so it was great to race on tried legs”.

Adam’s partner’s parents live in Forster and her Dad, Peter Camilleri, was the bike leg director and family friends, the Nixons, are the volunteer coordinators. “I was staying with them all weekend and to see how hard these guys work not only on the weekend but the weeks and months leading up to the race is amazing. They both race usually but to take the sideline and help out is great. All the volunteers made the race work and Forster is just an amazing place for a race. I hope the triseries takes off and becomes really popular”.

Matilda Raynolds, who came 2nd in the women’s Olympic distance, main comment after the race was that she was “very surprised”. Matilda’s coach Spot Anderson has been talking up Matilda and Siobhan to me recently and I have to say he was right on the mark.

I asked Matilda for some initial thoughts on the race “It was great to be racing near  top triathletes  like Lisa Marangon and Nicole Ward and to see my off season training being applied was very satisfying. I have definitely come away with a lot of areas to work on. Emo and Elite Energy should be congratulated on running a really enjoyable weekend and I hope to be able to get to more of the triseries races. Also a big thank you to Tri NSW for their support over the weekend and to my coach Spot Anderson”.

Matilda is someone to watch.

Nicole Ward  didn’t have her greatest race and as a long course specialist who hasn’t done many Olympic distance races she just wanted to go as hard as she could and have some fun. “My goal race at the moment is Gold Coast Half Ironman  in 2 weeks time and this weekend at Forster was about some good training to follow on from Port Douglas Long Course last weekend. I had a strong swim (apart from following Lisa (Marangon) off course on the first lap which lost us a bit of time!) and felt good on the bike but I didn’t have my usual run legs which is usually a strength for me. I felt a little off and fatigued from Port Douglas. I have never raced the weekend following a long course race before so it was new experience for me!”

Just outside the top 3 in the women’s race was up and comer  Siobhan McCarthy who posted the fastest run time in the Pro Series female race yesterday and almost took the fastest time again today missing out by three seconds to 2nd placed Matilda Raynolds. Siobhan’s enthusiasm is great to see and she was incredibly excited about her race today. Siobhan’s big takeaway from the weekend is “After racing against Lisa and Nicole and Matilda – I have some work to do on the bike”. Siobhan echoed comments of just about everyone there this weekend “The team at Elite Energy and the town of Foster did an amazing job, in a great venue to start the season, and I am looking forward to Husskison in November”.

Matthew Koorey showed that age is no barrier finishing 10th overall in a time of 2:03:10. Racing in this age group (40-44) against Matthew makes you wonder how you can compete against someone like that. Train more maybe.

Full Results – Results by age group further down the page…