At the front of my mind this week is family, over the last month I have spent 3 weeks on and off at home in Palmerston North working in our support office hoping to be around for the birth of my fifth niece/nephew and at the same time it has been perfect timing with my sister, her husband and three kids also living back in NZL after living overseas for the last ten plus years.

One of the greatest things about my family is how close we all are, although that presents it's roller coaster rides as expected when you spend as much time together as we do but we are always there and supportive of each other when we need it the most.

This is pretty awesome when it comes my training as they support it 100% and they have been part of my journey from the start.

I can still remember my first half ironman in December 2012 I came out of the water at Taupo to see mum and dad cheering me on and then 2km in on the bike passed my sister about three kilometres later along the lake front with my first niece on the front of her as she jumped up and down screaming “go Mikey gooooo”.

Now four years on everyone will be up in Taupo once again to cheer me on and of course my dad who is well known as the best support person and photographer.

It brings another feeling to the sport when you have family supporting and I look forward to having them there on the side-lines two weeks after Western Sydney 70.3 and IMNZL in March 2017.

Until next time, below are a few shots from my week with family, training with friends and riding motocross with my brother.

ROBO

“Everyone needs a house to live in, but a supportive family is what builds a home.”

That's right! Not only is the race season almost upon us but, after a time off from training and focusing o triathlons I am going to dust off my race cobwebs at Ironman 70.3 Western Sydney where I raced in 2014.

What makes this season exciting are all the changes I have made to get me to where I am. These are perhaps changes you may not be able to see but I can feel them. The feeling of gratification  that what you are doing feels like it is making a difference to you and those closest to you.

What makes this season even more exciting is that because of this I am 120% enjoying every moment of every day and a lot of it comes down to training. Because I am now at a fitness level that I have not felt for almost two years. As you can guess I love being competitive and it's mainly against myself and I guess that comes from 17 years of racing motocross.

I have learned though is that I have had a lot of self-doubt and it’s one thing that has held me back from achieving my best, the fear of failure before even beginning, the "if's" which presented opportunities to make excuses even before starting. This has not just been in my sporting career but also in life.

I have been learning to back myself and as I have branched out and moved to the Waikato after 6 years being home in the Manawatu it has been a relief to do something for me, with my own ambitions in mind and I think it has changed my approach on life a lot which in this case drastically changes my approach to this sport.

Looking back at 2014 I think I was starting to be burnt out, I did six 70.3's throughout that year, I won my age group at 70.3 Putrajaya which was a tough race but a great result and a big high. I diverted away from consistent training (From when I started in 2012 to 2014 I had always been self coached) but luckily I was still able to see results with top 10's at races finishing around my PB times on different courses.

I have been learning a lot over the last 4 months thanks to my coach and house mate Simon Cochrane and I have been able to compare my current strength with my 2014/2015 season. Looking back I was someone that had all the gadgets but no idea what they were telling me or how power the information was. I had the Garmin devices including power pedals but, I never raced to or understood what any of these numbers meant, which makes it very interesting looking back at previous race data and comparing my current fitness, numbers and my  race strategy which gives me a boost of positive vibes!

I don't know what this year will offer but I haven't been on such a high leading into a season with one ironman, thirteen 70.3' and two ultra-marathons under my belt, put this together with no expectation I believe this will produce my best result in the coming months but for now, I'll let my results do the talking once I race and just give it my all.

In short, I'm hungry to race and backing myself so, I say roll on Western Sydney only 6 weeks and counting and I'm ready to back myself 👊🏽

Until next time,

Robo

"You can quit if you want and no one will care, but you will know for the rest of your life"

Kia ora guys!

So as you may have seen over the last two weeks I have been would have been cycling a lot and there is a reason for this.

Like always we have niggles that come and go with high volume training however, last week for the first time during a speed session I could feel a sharp pain in the back of my calf so right away I stopped.

Now the fun of the sport comes which is forced rest from running however, we have three disciplines right? So luckily I can swim and cycle pain free, this is allowing me to now have a few weeks rest from running and focus on two disciplines that in the past have potentially been my "weakest".

The great thing about this is that I can stay active, maintain volume of training so that I continue to increase my fitness and strength. Although this won't improve my running directly I should be able to bounce back pretty quick with increased fitness.

After two weeks resting I can begin to get on the cross trainer and do some aqua joking to lightly apply pressure as I build back up to running.

Knowing this and being two months out from my first race allows me to stay positive and continue to enjoy my training.

Untill next time, train hard and smart 👊🏽

Robo

Kia Ora guys

Sorry about being slack the last few weeks, I haven't been putting time aside to keep my Blog more consistent and when I normally would be I have been to 'cracked' to put more than a few sentences together.

With my coach Simon Cochrane racing at IRONMAN Taiwan today I have been following his racing after joining him on his weekends sessions clocking up the bike and run miles at events like; doing a duathlon after a running race 😬 I wish I was out there with him but, it looks like a hot/hard day!

The great thing with our different levels of strength I can hold his wheel on the bike while still ticking my boxes in terms of my own intensity because let's face it, who wants to do 4-6 hours solo when you are smashing yourself, it makes it so much easier when you are putting someone else through their paces too.

Training Volume

I have continued to sit between 14-17 hours of training each week around work with short quality sessions during the week and doing majority of the volume on the weekends when I have time up my sleeve.

I've had one early morning doing a 1.20 hour bike set at 4am and then straight to the gym for a hour treadmill session before work at 8am, which I don't mind as I find training is self fulfilling in terms of the endorphins produced after a successful session.

Weight update

It's been three weeks since my blog about holding your self accountable, the first week was a bit iffy because we changed the scales we would weigh our self on, the second week I dropped .2kg while Roger dropped an impressive 1.4kg and this week I have dropped a further .3kg and Roger has dropped 1.2kg

What I have found that has helped is being aware of what I am eating and the contents that make it. It's crazy seeing how much sugar is in our day to day foods. One show that I found of real value is "that sugar film" which I highly recommend you check out! It's crazy what we are potentially feeding "our" children these days.

Well that me for now, I'll pull finger and make sure I keep you updated with my progress! All I can say in summary is that despite a niggle in my calf everything is coming along really well!

Until next time,

Robo ✌🏽️