Natalie Milne- Alpine Bikes sponsored Triathlete, talks about her final preparations before the start of the 2012 season.
“It’s just under a week now until my first race of the 2012 season, so I thought I’d give you an update on what my final preparations have been like. Back at the tail end of March I headed out to Andalucia in Southern Spain with the rest of the Triathlon Scotland Development Squad for their annual Easter training camp. The purpose of the stay was prep work, to make sure that we are all race sharp and ready to go for the new season following the long hard hours of winter training. Base for the 8 days was to be Kinetic PB, which is a specialist training centre for Triathlon in Cuevas del Almanzora. They have a superb set-up including a 1km long man-made lake which is perfect for open water swimming, along with lots of tracks and trails for running.
The roads in the area were great for riding, and unlike my local roads in Stirling, the road surface is fantastic! We did many rides into the rolling hills of the area. These ranged from hard individual efforts to fast group “chain gang” rides. One day we got caught out by the weather and ended up riding in a very angry thunder and lightning storm. This was pretty spectacular, not to mention scary! The final days of the camp were spent doing mini races, to make sure that our race skills were up to scratch, and we had the all important swim-bike and bike-run transitions dialed!
All this training has had to be fitted around my University commitments. I’m now finally able to relax after having got my dissertation handed in. Even got it done a couple of days early!
Last week I had the grueling task of 2 fitness tests to complete. That’s the thing about being a multi-sport athlete; you always have more than 1 test or set of equipment to sort out! One bike test, followed the next day by a run test. It’s every bit as horrible as you would imagine it to be. Basically you and your bike are hooked up to a multitude of monitoring equipment and pretty much ride until you can go no more! It’s a necessary evil, and is a great way of telling whether your training has had the desired effect. My attention now is on my first race of the season this weekend at the BUCS (British Universities) Sprint Triathlon Championships. After that I’ll be lining up with my Trek Madone, at the Scottish Womens Road Race Championships in Balfron nr Stirling, later in May.”
Natalie lines up this weekend at BUCS Sprint Triathlon Championships in Wiltshire.
