Hi Guys,
Hope you’ve all had a great October.
From a triathlete’s perspective, the highlight this month was obviously the Women’s Ironman World Championships in Kona, Hawaii. Without doubt, it was one of the most brutal, exciting, and inspirational races I have ever had the pleasure to witness. The only way to describe it accurately is to say it was absolute carnage. Carnage in the sense of watching these incredible female athletes put everything on the line, with many of them imploding like we have never seen before. Obviously, in Kona, the conditions play a big part in the outcome, but the heart and character these ladies showed to keep going in such brutally hot conditions was quite simply breathtaking. To see some of the toughest athletes in the world get so close to victory was also heartbreaking, but in the process, they won themselves admirers and fans the world over. This was winning in a different sense, and I know they will only be proud of these performances even if they came up short. They gave it everything on the most public stage of all, and you can only admire and respect them for that. It was, without doubt, the most exciting and drama-packed race I have ever seen.
I also wanted to give a very special shout-out to one of our female athletes who was also racing that day. And what a performance it was from our very own ‘Pocket Rocket’ – Vicki Hill – who became Britain’s highest-placed age-group finisher on the day. This was Vicki’s greatest ever performance on the Island for so many reasons. So, I think it’s only right that I shine a light on what she has been through to find a performance like this, because it tells a tale of so many of the issues that females face in sport.
For the past two years, Vicki has experienced far more lows in training and racing than ever before. Despite winning many races in that period, there had been a noticeable decline in her performance relative to previous years. More importantly, she spent a lot of time in training and racing not feeling good. She felt like she’d lost that spark and edge and probably thought the decline was age-related. The problem with all of this was that her usually high confidence in her abilities started to wane, and she began to question whether she was still the athlete she once was. That prompted a conversation where I first brought up the subject of menopause, due to the fact that she was experiencing so many issues and had reached the age of 50. From my perspective, I could spot the signs in her feedback and in our weekly conversations. For her, these were problems sleeping through the night, real sensitivity to training in the heat (something that had never been an issue before, as she lives in one of the hottest places in the world – Singapore), unusual weight gain, and just not performing in training and racing as we knew she could. She also had many more bad days than good ones.
From a training perspective, it was clear a change was desperately needed. So, we had open and honest conversations about not following the same path and instead making some big changes to plug the gaps we felt were missing. Alongside this, I suggested she find the best menopause Doctor in Singapore and get all the tests done to see where her hormones were at. Through this extensive testing, we discovered which hormones needed rebalancing because they were out of sync. She was also particularly low in testosterone (for women, which is already much lower than men). Frustratingly, she was told that to race Ironman triathlon, she was not allowed to supplement with testosterone in any way to bring it back to normal levels. So, we had to work around this.
Training-wise, we increased the amount of strength work she did in the gym and raised the levels of load needed to counteract the loss of lean muscle tissue we all experience as we age. We also introduced a lot more high-intensity work into her training, with less overall volume and more recovery. The goal of this was to improve hormone production and function. This is something many women at all stages of menopause respond incredibly well to because they have natural endurance engines anyway. The good news was that progress started to show. But then a unique opportunity presented itself in late June last year – Vicki decided to give up her job to pursue a new career path: Vicki Hill Triathlon Coaching.
This gave us a unique opportunity where suddenly Vicki had shaken off the shackles of her incredibly busy and stressful job as a teacher at a top Singapore secondary school. Over the years, I think Vicki had really underestimated what this job, alongside Ironman training, had taken out of her. Looking back now, I can safely say she was probably running on fumes for a few years and was pretty burned out. For 20+ years, I’ve been astounded at what women take on daily, with rest and recovery being an afterthought. It would finish most of us men off in a fraction of the time! Vicki was most definitely in that category.
So, she decided to grasp this new opportunity with both hands and focus purely on training and recovery through to the Ironman World Champs before building her new business. This involved a four-week training camp in Phuket – somewhere she dearly loves training. All I can say is that the progress she made from August through to race day was exponential. We started to see progress in almost every session she did. Most importantly, she felt GREAT. It was like having the Vicki of old back again, and the health and happiness she exuded during this period was in stark contrast to the past few years. I can’t tell you what this did to her dented confidence. She started to believe again because she was doing things in training that she hadn’t done for a long time. Her speed was up, her power on the bike was up, she got stronger and more mobile – she even started to enjoy swimming! We also introduced more heat training (sauna) into her weekly routine, combined with cold water work. She also focused far more on recovery because now she had the time to do it. This included weekly massages, more relaxation, and better sleep. It worked like a dream and it seemed she had managed to shift the life balance scales back in her favour. She now had momentum on her side.
What also surprised me was that her usually excellent ability to tolerate heat came back, and through a few dietary changes, she started to get back to the weight she raced best at. There were so many times she said to me, “I can’t believe how good I feel.”
Many people asked me how I thought Vicki would go in Hawaii just before the race. I’ll be honest – I didn’t know, but I had a good feeling. All I knew was that it was the happiest I’d ever seen her, and from the training data, all the signs were excellent. I just said that when she’s happy, she races well – and she was in the best place I had seen her for many years. The rest was up to the Island Gods. I also received a photo on race morning that told me all I needed to know… when an athlete sends you a photo like that, you know something special could be about to happen. And it did.
After what proved to be a very choppy swim, Vicki was in 88th position out of 208. She then put the hammer down on the bike to finish in 13th position, and then slowly moved through on the run to place 6th. An extraordinary achievement. To illustrate how good her performance was, she did two 70.3s earlier this year before she gave up her job. Her run time in Hawaii was actually faster than both the 70.3 races she did – at half the distance!
From my perspective, one of the key areas Vicki got so right in the build-up to Hawaii was the balance she achieved both inside and outside training. Outside of training, she did everything she feasibly could to rest, recover, and reduce stress. For me, this highlights one of the biggest mistakes many triathletes make when seeking improvement. It’s rare to find a triathlete who isn’t prepared to train hard; where most fall down is failing to recognise that recovery is just as important. As the Norwegians say, “We focus on recovery just as much as we do on training” – and just look at their results. I’m not saying everyone needs to give up their jobs and train full-time (although that would be nice!), but there are so many ways this area can be improved. I can’t even begin to tell you how many athletes I’ve coached over the years who get the balance out of sync in the build-up to a big race, and it ultimately has the biggest impact on their performance. Too much stress (life, work, relationships), not enough recovery, everything left to the last minute – this all chips away at the mental and physical energy you need on full charge come race day. Fail to nurture that and you’re asking for trouble.
And don’t just take my word for it — I asked Vicki to list the top five factors that were key to her performance. In true triathlete fashion, she couldn’t stop at five… so we ended up with seven! See below:
1. Remove stress: The number one thing was removing as much stress from my life. It’s amazing how much work stress was taking its toll without me noticing until it was suddenly not there. Being in a high state of stress was just the norm, trying to fit a million things into a day!
2. Recovery: Prioritising recovery – regular weekly massages (before something was hurting!), sauna and ice bath – my new favourite thing, better sleep (no screens, no emails before bed), and naps during the day. Listening to my body and having a rest day when needed, not being a slave to the training plan!
3. Nutrition: I became obsessed with eating enough protein daily (120g) and fuelling better around training. No more fasted training – before morning sessions, I’d always have carbs and protein. For higher-intensity sessions, I made sure to take in carbohydrates before. I also ate proper food as soon as I could after training – good amounts of all macronutrients and plenty of fibre. Just being more mindful about what I was eating and when helped me shift some weight that had crept on over the past two years.
4. Fueling during training: For longer sessions (2+ hours), I aimed for 75g carbs/hour, 1 litre of water plus 750mg sodium (as it’s always hot here!). Shorter sessions had less, but I made sure I was on top of fueling during each session.
5. Supplements: Taking enough supplements to open a small wellness franchise – haha! Not sure if they helped, but I tried something new: creatine, magnesium, collagen, adaptogens, AG1… maybe time to start weaning myself off a few.
6. Strength work: Consistency with strength training, plus regular use of the roller and keeping on top of any physio/mobility exercises.
7. Support network: Having everyone around me on board and supportive of what I was doing helped me keep a positive mindset. Oh, and a month in Phuket where the only agenda was train, eat, recover, sleep – all other distractions were removed!
As her Coach I couldn’t be any prouder of Vicki because she really has been through the mill these past few years through no fault of her own. She’s had to battle her body and mind and as frustrating as it was for her, she never gave up hope. I saw her push through some of the hardest races of her life due to the brutal conditions in Asia to earn that slot in Hawaii when she didn’t feel good. She came full circle again with this race and it was wonderful to see. She’s a class act both in and out of triathlon and I have no doubt she will be a hugely successful triathlon coach moving forwards.
Ironman Worlds Championships (Hawaii)
- Vicki Hill
- Splits: swim 1:22:37 / bike 5:39:29 / run 3:38:37
- Total Time: 10:50:32
- 6th/ 208 in the 50-54 category
Ironman Barcelona
- Augustin Downes
- Splits: swim 1:11:27 / bike 5:46:03 / run 3:46:10
- Total Time: 10:54:16
- 40-44 category
- Guy Walker
- Splits: swim 1:09:28 / bike 5:08:28 / run 4:09:40
- Total Time: 10:40:59
- 30-34 category
Two stunning sub 11 hour performances from Augustin & Guy at the Barcelona Ironman. Augustin had every triathletes nightmare – a mechanical, that saw him get stuck in the same gear for 170km on the bike! He didn’t let that phase him though and still managed to post an excellent bike time. But it was on the run that he truly came into his own to post a superb 3:46 marathon.
Swim squadder Guy also massively excelled and showed he has quite talent for Ironman racing to go sub 11 hours in his first ever Ironman! A foot injury in the weeks and months leading into the race put pay to what he might be capable on the run but he more than made up for it on the day with a superb swim & bike performance. Absolutely outstanding.
Challenge Barcelona (Middle distance)
- Peter Hicks
- Splits: swim 33:34 / bike 2:29:13 / run 1:40:42
- Total Time: 4:55:26
- 13th in the 25-29 category
Huge shout-out to our young gun, Peter Hicks, who absolutely smashed his 70.3 PB by an incredible 15 minutes to go sub-5 hours for the first time! Conditions in Barcelona were absolutely atrocious, but Peter dug deep, battled through, and capped it off with an impressive 11-minute run PB. Terrific work, Peter — what a way to finish your season!
Greece 70.3
- Hollie Strawson
- Splits: swim 30:46 / bike 2:37:57 / run 1:44:13
- Total Time: 4:58:43
- 3rd female in the 30-34 category
Your first official podium finish is always a special milestone, and huge congratulations go to swim squadder Hollie, who delivered a superb performance to take 3rd place in her age group at Greece 70.3. An outstanding effort — here’s hoping it’s the first of many to come!
Cascais 70.3 (Portugal)
- Flo Smart
- Splits: swim 34:34 / bike 2:50:00 / run 1:46:14
- Total Time: 5:19:24
- 8th out of 99 in the 30-34 category
Huge congrats to Flo, who delivered her fastest ever time over this distance in brutally tough, hot conditions in Portugal. With temperatures nearing 30 degrees, she managed to post personal bests in the swim, bike, and run to complete the hat-trick! Think there’s plenty more to come from this one.
Sant Josep de sa Talaia open water swim, Ibiza
Great to see our boys back in action the Ibiza 10k swim. Sami even managed to take 2nd place overall in 2hrs 43mins. Was also hugely pleased to see Andy complete his first 10k swim with a superb performance to finish 5th in 2hrs 45mins.
The Hurly Burly 10k open water swim
Huge congrats to our swim ladies & gents who took part in the 10k Hurly Burly swim. The Hurly Burly is a spectacular 10 km open-water swim set in the stunning Mawddach Estuary, Snowdonia. Starting on Barmouth Beach, swimmers ride the powerful incoming tide upstream towards Penmaenpool, flanked by dramatic mountain scenery and shifting tidal currents. It’s fast, wild, and exhilarating — a unique blend of endurance and adventure where nature sets the pace. The event finishes with fire pits, hot food, and a sense of shared triumph, all in support of the charity Level Water, which provides swimming lessons for children with disabilities.
What I’ve been reading & watching this month…
If you love stories about pushing human limits, this one’s for you. The Endurance Artist dives into the eccentric and uncompromising world of Lazarus Lake — the mastermind behind the Barkley Marathons, one of the toughest races on earth. It’s a gripping look at what drives athletes to suffer, persist, and find meaning in the pursuit of the impossible. Part philosophy, part madness, and entirely endurance at its rawest, this book will leave you questioning what “enough” really means.
I Swear is a film that make you laugh out loud and have you reaching for the tissue box in equal measure. It’s one of those rare films that takes you on an emotional roller coaster like no other. It’s also one of those must watch films that can help people understand what it is like to live life with a poorly understood illness. That illness being Tourette’s syndrome. The acting is incredible throughout and it can only be described as an award winning performance from Robert Aramayo. He plays John Davidson, who has become an ambassador for the illness after being diagnosed with it at young age. What was so tragic up until those early teenage years was that John was a very happy & popular boy, he also showed promise as a goalkeeper and had dreams of becoming a footballer. Then his world was completely turned upside down. This true story is as brutal as it is uplifting and you can’t help but think that no human being should have to go through what he went through. Thanks to John, many people now living with the illness and also those that don’t have a far greater understanding of the illness.
Team out & about this month
More Kona spam. It’s not just about the race, it’s as much fashion, good coffee and cake all rolled into one you know! 
From one adventure to another….this time Nick & Bex hit Canada for an ‘unofficial’ training camp.
Cannot wait to test these babies! Wildpool swim shoes in full effect @wilpookuk