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Montlucon makes silver in Tours

Mr Elvery is back folks;)

Taranakis white kenyan in full flight;) 3rd fastest run of day 15.49

 MONTLUCON GETS SILVER IN TOURS

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                            
Sunday 29th August a true team was born.
Absolutely stoked, we came, we saw, we conquered.
The results were epic for a small team that has half the annual budget of its fellow competitors and
there we were 2nd on the podium and absolutely stoked to make it happen.
James Elvery had a blinder swim, coming out in the lead pack, to seal the deal and ride in the ten
man breakaway.
Myself and Mr Ryan Sissons had to settle for the chase pack as did our french national champion Yohann Vincent and
our Czech republic speedster Prema Svarc.
I had a wee go to pull back some time on the breakaway with Matt Charbot and Steffen Justus but to no avail. Within a lap Bignet was onto us, as was Beijing, biking, breakawy, Belgium monster Axel Zeebrock. So from 30seconds down off the bike, I knew the only way foward was to bring my dancing feet to the running show.
That I did, having a brilliant run for the day and for the first time in my career having a podium run split overall behind bronze medallist at the Europeans this year David Hauss FRA in the Le Gardere team and Steffen Justus GER also of this team.
Godsped Mr Elvery to a serious upgrade in his CV though, passing him with less than one kilometre to go and he hung on for dear life to get that ohh so special top ten finish for the nice financial bonus from Uncle Jerome.
An awesome team effort all round though, one I have been waiting for five years to see happen, much respect to the team with a dream that came through on the day and the timing couldnt be better two weeks out from the World Championships in Budapest Hungary, give me fuel, give me fire, give me double my desire.
Kia Kaha
 Clarky
 
boys loving that podium, pew pew
clarkus rawkus
amping for a podium todaysuccess, made that podium 8th and 10th, go the Grammar mantra

 

ITU World Cup 2010

crossing the finish in 10th

Des moines, IOWA, ITU World Cup 2010 done and dusted 10th place and a season best for 2010 and a mere 304seconds off the eventual winner and dominator of event Tim Don from Eng.
Great for us kiwi men to get three in the top ten and in the women three in the top 12, I can hear that new funding from SPARC definately singing in our direction, roll on the rugby player wages in short;)

Definately a great way to get the ball rolling for this year.

Huge thanks to everyone with your emails, support, wisdom and belief in me, may it continue on me road to London.

Peace

Minneapolis LTF and Paris French GP

12th-19th July

Well last few training hit outs/ races before the business end of the season, the whole purpose of Minneapolis was to vent a bit of frustration, too many times have I been the workhorse for ITU athletes in the last five years of racing World Cups and WCS. So this day was my first and definately not my last chance and oppurtunity to unleash the beast within. The format of all  six Toyota Cup (American Pro series races) are to race the athletes in a non drafting Olympic format, bringing back the axes of ITU from the 90s, Matt Reed to name one and encourage an honest 2hrs ofr racing with a hard swim, hard bike and hard run.

Was great to step away from the ITU for a racing format for a weekend towards my bid of qualifying for London.
With my burrowed LOOK t.t bike from Colorado multisports a pimped up SRM and a whole heap of determination to get well under that hour for a 40k t.t, Sparky was off to Minneapolis and keen to make a few US dollars.
The end result was ok, not what the goal was, a podium definately was realistic at the 25km mark on the bike until a draft buster quite favourably stood me down for a so called USAT staggering penalty. Normally i wouldnt kick up a fuzz as I am all for draft busting and all that jazz, but this new staggering thing makes no sense and well if you are 40m behind an athlete, u have to be either 2m to the left of their line they are riding or two metres to their left, which sux coz they pulled me up as i was about to pass Craig Alexander on a bloody round about, u tell me how u dont ride the same line as someone in front of u going through a roundabout at 45kms and hour
mehh.
Anyway… I got stood down for a minute and my well worked up position of three slipped away into the horizon as Greg Bennett passed me, David Thompson and Filip Osplay.
So i had to wreck meself for the last 10k of the bike just to get back into the race. my average wattage of 353 had to go up to 450 for the last ten k, just to get back some of my 1min deficit, which isnt easy when my aerobic threshold on the bike is 360 watts, threshold meaning av heart rate i hold 150/165bpm without producing too much lactic for the run.
So those figures were basically thrown out the window for the last 10k in order for me to make amends on the run. I finished the bike with a 58min 40k t.t split, which was a 57, had i not had to stand down for a minute.
Matt Reed took the cake on the bike for the day riding a solid 57 low 40k split to go on and win the race with a 32min high 10k split.
I ran solid to the five k mark running hard with Filip Osplay, whom also suffered a 1min stand down on the bike for losing a drink bottle… yeah go figure, yanks make up their own rules to suit the winners as long as they are from USA sometimes I think.
Finished solid in 5th nailing a few smaller non drafting US athletes in the last 2k of the run, Cameron Dye and David Thompson
..
Will be back for u USA for LA and Dallas later this season, staz tuned.
On a plane back to Denver, crash course in packing, repacking, droppin off a t.t bike, sorting out money issues as always and then on a plane onward to Europe. Vive le Paris.
The team had a fantastic result is all I can say, Ryan Sissons came to take his part in Montlucon for his first time ever and passed in flying colors finishing in 8th place, making the famous Beauvais Mafia lead pack and hangin on for dear life as they continued to drop the hammer for a solid 20k averaging 465 watts to set up Gemmell for the win. Funny thing is even after all that effort from Beauvais, the star studded Brownlee senior and Junior show stole the podium coming in one two for the end result.
But history was made yesterday for us, the first team podium from Montlucon since 2003 when the famous Yannick Borseaux tore it up in Dunkerque.
Since then Montlcuon has had a lot of help from many famous seasoned campaigners, Benjamin Sanson, Paul Amey, recently James Elvery and Tony Dodds and finally with the arrival of Mr Ryan Sissons we got that podium.
With two more races in the French Grand Prix to go and the overall placing of our team sky rocketing from 13th to now a credible 5th in the GP we are more than capable of turning some heads and rolling into the big time of stardom within the ranks of the French GP… stay tuned.
London WCS this weekend, on the path of paving to Olympic glory awaits me…
Kia Kaha Kiwana
Sparky

Boulder

Back in Boulder, training going great, feeling really in control and everything working how it needs to be in time for the business end of the season in Europe from July- September.

Weather is amazing most days over 30degrees and the tan is looking epic.

Next stop Minneapolis Lifetime Fitness Triathlon on 10th July, my first and only attempt at some non drafting racing.

Bring it;)

http://www.youtube.com/user/robcreasytv#p/a/u/1/JquXXU3A6Ao

latest run training block, two solid days with 12k tempo run and finished with a meaty 8×1kms on south trail, stay tuned for posting on facebook.

Ellice in money at triathlon
Taranaki Daily News

New Plymouth’s Clark Ellice recorded one of his best performances in elite company when finishing 10th at the rich Des Moines World Cup triathlon event in Iowa yesterday.

On a day when Kiwis dominated the top 10, Ellice held his form over the final stages to finish in one hour 50 minutes 54 seconds, just 34sec behind Great Britain’s Tim Don, who won in 1hr50min20sec. Ellice won US$9000.

Palmerston North’s Kris Gemmell was just four seconds shy of the richest prize in the sport when pipped by Don, who walked away with US$200,000 ($NZ287,395). Gemmell won US$50,000 for his strong finishing surge.

Auckland’s Bevan Docherty also finished strongly, in fourth place earning US$20,000, with Ellice 10th as the Kiwis picked up valuable ranking points towards qualification for the London Olympic Games.

The bulk of the field stayed together throughout the cycle leg, with the only attempted breakaway coming from young New Zealander Ryan Sissons, who stole 20 seconds on the field midway through, only to be reeled in before the 10km run.

Gemmell led off the bike and on to the run but could not match the pace of Don, with the former world champion turning back the clock in a display of running not seen for some years.

Gemmell was impressive as he paced his race almost to perfection to kick clear of Australian Courtney Atkinson to claim second, while Docherty cleared away from fifth-placed Beijing Olympic Champion Jan Frodeno, of Germany.

Earlier, a strong showing from the New Zealand women could not stop an Australian assault in the women’s race, with Emma Snowsill winning from compatriot Emma Moffatt.

Andrea Hewitt was the best of the New Zealanders in fifth place, continuing her consistent run of strong results.

Nicky Samuels finished eighth, closely followed by Debbie Tanner in 11th and Kate McIlroy in 12th.

2010 Photos

me and stu nailed the last track session b4 Buda

the wise blonde Yoda

Michelle congratulates me after a rough morning at the office

run boy run 63 400m pace is the new sub 3min k;)

[caption id="attachment_184" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="when the pain sets in, chuck on your facial cam"][/caption]

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clarkellice@gmail.com