Currently I am half way through a big block of hard work which will carry me through a heap of races in France for my team Lagardere, Germany for my Bundesliga team Buschhutten and the World Champs Series races in Madrid and Kitzbuhel.  I’m currently ranked 9th in the World and want to try to keep that top 10 ranking for the whole year and improve on it!  I can’t wait for the next adventures abroad but I’ve still got some really hard work to finish before I am ready for them!

The first week back was really tough!  I was desperately trying to back up my routine and be as consistent as possible after all the travel, racing, catching up with friends and family, a little bit of illness that comes with racing and travel and the night where I treated myself to a few beers didn’t help me either!

I’ve really enjoyed being back though.  4.5 months away makes my friends here seem interesting again!…I’ve got some great training buddies up in Loughborough and even the same old routes seem new again!  I have to say this amazing weather we’ve had for the past 3 weeks has helped!

The running in Loughborough is good at the moment especially since we’ve had a new influx of fast runners hit Loughborough for the first time in years!  Ryan Mcleod is back for a while fresh from a 13:40 5k. As well as the Tri Gold boys Mark Buckingham, Matt Gunby and Adam Bowden who are giving me a hard time on the track at the moment!  I’ll keep chasing them as hard as possible though and it’s better for me to be chasing something then leading every session in my comfort zone!

Finally. While I was out in Australia I was having conversations with BMW and I’m really pleased to announce a 18 month contract with Elms in Cambridge.  I’m currently rocking a X1 but only till the 5 Series GT turns up which will be AWESOME.  I’m very grateful to these guys and excited to be working with them…Obviously!

Just a quick update from me…Hope everyone is well and enjoying the beginning of the season!

Will

Ich is feeling pretty average so far but hoping to come good in the next few days after this work out today which certainly wasn’t as comfortable as I wanted it to be.  Mark Pearce, performance manager took the shots…he’s much better with the camera then me but sometimes he teaches me some tricks and I hope to take mine up to his level at some point.  REALLY good pics though.

Not lots of banter just yet…Adidas man came over the other day to take measurements. Adam Bowden has arms 7cm shorter then the next man. We call him T-Rex.  My quads are the biggest by 7cm:) However now Phil Graves has arrived from UK 70.3 so…

Olly Freeman, Adam Bowden, me and Johnny Brownlee

Check out his quads!

I have been cracking in the miles running doing a fair bit with Adam Bowden or Ryan Mcleod.  Guys who are quicker which is nice! Certainly pushes you on.  We had a fun run at the weekend, a clean 2hrs and 28k’s, Deano led the way and it was an interesting route to say the least!  I did the last 30mins with Lola and was able to push on, the poor dog got dropped so that was a nice confidence booster!

The swimming and biking have also been ramping up and the winter is shaping up nicely.

Here are some pics from the past week.

One of our new sessions in the lab, I am riding with Aaron Harris on a treadmill that goes up to 15% and 60KPH

Lola watching over the Boardman.  She likes to give high5’s

With JD for a Retul session in Milton Keynes, bike set up

The last bit especially was a good, we had lots of fireworks.  It got a big boring towards the end so we began sending various items up in the sky with it…like a slice of bread:)

Todays weapons of choice are as follows!

It’s going really well so far, It definitely gets easier the older you get, probably more relevantly the more years you have of backing up the hours.

I was hurting big time in the first few days, I was blowing up in every session and I felt in a right state! Then it just clicked and now I am actually training pretty solidly.  I think 5 swims easy swims (just 2/3k drills) 7hrs of running and 10 hrs on the bike in the hills is pretty exciting start for the first week.

I can’t wait to get stuck into some hard running though, we have lots of good guys to run with up in Loughborough at the moment.  Adam Bowden just joined our group.  He is a top British Steeplechaser and has run 7:50 for 3k.  Last season was his first Triathlon season and he ran a 29min 10k on the track half way through!!! Pretty impressive off Triathlon training!  As well as Ryan Mcleod and the massive Loughborough Athletics Club should be fun.  I want another week of miles in my legs then I will get stuck into it.  It’s a first because usually I don’t start running fast week in week out till March.