Let’s kick off this week with our results. Two athletes racing and two outstanding results that rewarded the hard work put in at training. Pleasing thing for me was our young athletes shining through so well.

Newcastle Marathon

Lachie Hutcheon (you may know him from White Horse) asked me to coach him to a marathon that he and his mates made a pact to do. Always a tough task but when I sat down and realised we were starting from 5k and had a race in 10 weeks I knew we had a task on our hands. Lachie didn’t miss a beat as we worked together every step of the way. A safe start to make sure the legs were okay led to a more agrressive build that got us to 32km. I knew all we had to do was make sure pacing and nutrition were perfect. No guessing. The result was a 3:28 and the start of something big. Lachie is only 19 years old but showed the maturity and smarts of a veteran of the game and that’s what pays off

Tilbury Classic

Sarah Brown has really stepped up her game lately. The crew in Lane 4 are now doing their best to hold on, but the feet are starting to disappear off the front at times. Sarah asked me recently to start coaching her for a big target, the South Head Roughwater swim (10km from Bondi to Watsons Bay) and the extra km are adding endurance to an already strong swimmer. This weekend, Sarah swam in a lead up event called the Tilbury Classic. A 2km event that would help with open water skills and getting the experience up a notch. Sarah came 1st in her age, and 3rd female across the line in 32:58. An outstanding race from a great athlete and person.

New Sponsor Announcement - SSG Legal

I am stoked to let everyone know that HPT has a new sponsor on board. SSG Legal. Long time HPT athlete Steve Mackay started SSG Legal about 7 years ago and has gone from strength to strength. He has poured his heart and soul into it and I am so happy that it has now got to a point now where he can be a member of the HPT sponsor family. Welcome aboard Dr. Steve !

Case Study - Lactate Test on a Competitive Swimmer

It’s not often I get to do a metabolic test on a non-endurance athlete so this was a great opportunity to explore a new area. Our athlete was a 17 year old that has been a very competitive swimmer all through his youth. With times of 27 for 50 back and 2:00 for 200 free the numbers that came out were as expected from an athlete that has been in a youth swimming program. High glycolytic numbers and a curve that went quite steeply towards those numbers after the warm up and first step of the 6 x 200 step test. The conclusion was that he is now in a great position to specialise. If it’s 50-100’s he needs more specialistion on that in training, if its 200’s and 400’s he will need a lot more volume below LT1.

What I’m Seeing This Week

This snippet is a new appearance to the newsletter. Aimed at getting my thoughts and observations over to the team.

This week I really noticed the important place Strava has in this sport. So much that I am spending time daily watching sessions unfold and comments added that help me see how sessions are going. This isn’t a new phenomenon but it’s definitely a growing trend.

The Sutho Sessions :

Monday - Swim - Public Holiday time of 4pm

Wednesday - Swim - 6pm

Thursday - Track - 6pm

Breaking Through