Last 2 weeks,I was in Asia with 3 fellow Belgians Asia for 2 world cups of the ITU circuit.
The first race was in South-Korea, in the city of Tongyeong. This was a sprint format. Unfortunately, I didn’t have a good race. I had a bad swim and missed the big pack on the bike by a few seconds. I finished in a dissapointing 38th place.
Tongyeong was a beautiful location to train, so I stayed for a few more days before I left for the next race, this time in Japan.
The race in Japan was an olympic distance race. I was determined to make up for the bad race a week before.
After a confusing start (some false starters) I didn’t have a very good start of the swim, but I made up some lost time during the swim. I had a decent swim and got myself in the chasing pack. We worked together very well and were coming closer to the leaders. Then 5 guys broke away from the front pack. By the time we caught the group in front of us, the leaders already had a significant gap which only got bigger. I had a good 2nd transition and started the 10km run with some very good runners by a defecit of just over 30 seconds on the leaders. We were able to catch 2 athletes in front of us. In the last 500m, I had to let go of a few guys because my legs were destroyed and I couldn’t accelerate anymore.
But nevertheless I was really happy with my 9th place!
Now for some rest and then the last race of the seaon, Continental Cup in Dakhla (MOR) on the 2nd of december!
