Hi,

Last Saturday was hold in Ponteverda the European Championship. As a local triathlete, was a competition that I was excited about it, so I had prepared specially and worked very hard in order to be on my best shape.

However, severe stomach problems did not allow me to run, I even had to stop twice. On the second stop I could not continue, but due to  the crowds that had gathered in the streets and Ivan Raña, who  encouraged me,  (when he saw me stopped) to continue, even just jogging if it was necessary. So I decided to keep going as respect for everyone, I had to cross the finish line even if It was far away from the leaders, and I did so. I kept running with Ivan and we both crossed the finish line far away from our initial goal were, the top places.

The truth is that on the bike I did not feel good. It is also true that the heat does not suit me well, but I was  too thirsty, I drank and drank (hot water, as the drink in the bottles seemed hot clear soup) but I did not quench, liquid only accumulated in the stomach but I did not assimilated it.


Of course, I am very sad and angry for not having been able to compete and fight for top positions, because I think the crowd deserved it and, without any doubt, I  had trained very hard for it. But this is sport, not mathematics, and sometimes things do not happen as expected. Despite the negative experience, I can not say it was a day to forget. In fact I think it was a day that I will never forget because people showed me respect and support that really touched me. When you win you''re used to public applause and do not really think much about it because it is normal. The audience applauds winners obviously. But when you''re in a moment of pain, when you are losing the race, when you suffer and you cannot give what is inside of you, and people is still encouraging, supporting and giving their love, well that feeling ... I had not ever felt it, so I will never forget this race. As I said, I regret for not being able to perform well but I hope that everyone enjoyed a great event of triathlon, with many of the world''s best triathletes competing.



Given the huge of comments, opinions, messages received etc ... about  the controversy generated by the action of Harry Whiltshire in swimming, I have to talk about it and I would like to explain what happened.


First of all, I want to clarify  that the problems I had with my stomach were not linked to what happened in the water... unless the cause of my stomach problems were the amount of water that this guy made me  swallow. But I do not believe so.

 Secondly, I want to say that Brownlees were the best in this championship, therefore, fair winners.

 I have been competing 13 years in triathlons, in all kinds of levels and conditions. I have been hitted  thousands of times, I''ve dated black eyes water, cuts, scratches ... (are there anyone  dedicated to this who has not suffered these things?) and  I understand that in the water you may be hitted, kicked , especially in the buoys because everyone wants to go to the same place and this leads to situations of tension and sometimes quite aggressive. That''s normal. What is not normal is that one guy looks for you, finds you, and then he focuses only on you, trying to provocate you  a bad race, and driving you out of order.

 Most of you would have seen a video on the Internet which is a SMALL PART of the aggressions I received. Everything starts on the second lap of the swim, when I was well positioned about 6 th or 7 th. The first thing I notice and happened, was someone grabing my foot and pulling me back, losing a little distance from those who preceded me, but I could restart fast without losing positions (not shown in this video). The second thing that happens is that (and this can be clearly  watched on the video) Harry rushes to me and sinks me grabbing my head and shoulder. Then when I restart he locates parallel to me, to my left, and instead of going to the buoy, he takes me out of the right direction to head that buoy. I struggle with him in order to find the right way. When we  finally reach  the buoy he literally crash with the buoy, losing  his speed, staying there blocking me, and losing a few positions (not shown in this video). When I achieve to turn (by hits),with him next to me on paralell, it happens the worst on terms of wasted time. Instead of following the draft of our predecessors, who were near the shore of the river, heading to the last pitch before getting out of the water, this guy pushes me to the right, I mean, towards the river’s center, out of the draft of the front athletes, which it is a waste of time and energy (this part is also watched in the video, two guys swimming away from the others). At first I think that he is disoriented and I struggle to show him that he has to go left to follow the others. But I soon realized he had no intention to correct his direction.Then, located parallel to him at his right, I could not take the correct direction, and he had no problem beating me if I tried to push him to the left. I increased the pace to get along and then  move to the left, but he also accelerated and kept swimming parallel to me. Finally, fed up with the situation, I stopped letting him go so I could switch sides. Then I quickly started swimming to the left, the correct side. Now he was on my right and he inmediatly swam back towards me,pushing me this time to the other side, near the rocks on the shore.


Thus, after brutal energy expenditure and even larger wasted time, we reach the ladders to get out of the water where he blocked me (and this is very clear in the video) and instead of getting up and run to the transition, he looks back and stands blocking my way. Then another thing, which is not seen on the video, is that when we run on the long transition, he continually looks back to me, taking me against the fence when I tried to overtake him, until I finally pushed him away and I keep a clear path. His performance, which strongly pissed me off  along with the energy expenditure, made me  losing the lead group (again, before to 400m  to  transition,  I was swimming 6 th  or 7th  following the leaders, at most 5 seconds behind the first swimmer and I finished getting out of the water at 18th position, 22 sec behind them).

 

But his dirty work did not end here, because when we were riding hard on the bike in order to catch the front chase pack, he dedicated himself to get into the turns organization in order to disturb, creating situations of real danger in the chase pack, riding sometimes over 60 km / h. This also complained Fred Belaubre, Laurent Vidal and David Hauss. In addition, journalists who were on the motorbikes following the race were witnesses too.

 I know that this explanation has been a bit long but I prefer to tell what exactly happened and clarify that. As a triathlete, I am very upset that one colleague, instead of going out, compete and doing his best (like everyone else) he started the race with the clear goal of removing and hurt an opponent, in this case was me. I think this is an unacceptable behaviour that goes against the fundamental values ​​that should instil the sport, so I hope that it never happens again in the future.

Many people asked me if I think this was a deliberate tactic of the British team. Obviously I cannot know it. My personal opinion is not, emphatically. Both Alistair and Jonathan are good enough to win races in a fair behaviour, as they always did. I consider them great champions and I have great respect for them. Also, I have nothing against the British federation or anyone else who has not directly caused this situation. I have many friends in the British team. They showed me that they are not only great athletes but great guys as well. Many of them have given  me their support and I thank them for their words. Like all other athletes who condemn such actions.

 

With this explanation, from my part I consider this situation ended. My concern right now is recover my stomach making the proper tests  in order to find out the cause of the problem, and focus on the next big race  in Hamburg on July 16th. I love this sport and I love racing, so my mind is focused on that.

Thank you very much to everyone, especially the people who took the streets in Pontevedra. And apologizes for any mistake on my english, as you know is not my first language.

Javi.

Hello Friends,

The first thing I want to say is Thanks for your support the last weekend in Madrid. Thanks to all who were there watching the race and those you could not attend but supported me from your houses. It may seem like , but having the audience on your side when you compete gives you an extra  plus, that you do not  not get when you're out. But this  extra plus was not enough to beat the Brownlee this time.  What a performance  they did ...

 
Let's proceed step by step. Racing at home is always strange. On the one hand you have that public supporting you, which is important, in addition you usually know the circuit perfectly. The bad part is everything else, he, he. I always try to be calm and have time to sleep well and relax the days before the competition, when you reduce volume of training and what should prevail is rest. And again, I did not succeed. Last week was tough in terms of commitments, events, interviews and more. Which is good, we want this sport to grow and we need to be available to the media so they can talk to us. But media remember us the days we do not like, the days before the race. Of course, it is understandable from the media point of view. Anyway, the week had many hours of those where you do not rest but not train. So racing at home is hard and difficult, but that's something that I already expect and I assume as part of my job. And, of course, on this occasion, did not alter the final outcome of the race.


At 10.06 the war began. In the water I felt pretty good, in the first lap of 750m avoided the blows and I settled into a comfortable third place. In the second lap, when you are more relaxed knowing that you're already in very good place, someone grabs my foot, literally, standing on the float and pushed me back. Why? No idea, is something hard to understand when the who does it  have a very good position too, but these things happen. I will make a reflection in another article, otherwise I would extend too much. In conclusion, I lost a few positions; I took a few strokes and a little extra effort to keep the top.

 

I left the water in good standing, my transition was not the best (I got a bit confused with the helmet), but got on the bike and I felt strong. I know from experience that the first ascent to the is critical and can decide the rest of the bike, so I went up strong, overtaking  Frodeno and Tayama, who at first lap got cut but fell back a lap later. There was distance with the pack,  so I pushed hard to escape, working as Alistair, Jony and I, with some occasional relay on the plain of another of the 9 who were with us. I was worried about many people did not give relays, in this type of race at the pace we were going, you realized that if someone does not work is  because he can not. We soon realized that the that victory would be among us. I have confidence in my running after a hard bike and I knew that Brownlees were tired after work by bike. If they were, of course they hide it very well as we could see!

I made a good transition out ahead of my rivals. As Alistair and Jony overtake me, I stuck to them and was clearly going to suffer the most to stay with them. The pace was frenetic from the beginning but, as at other times, I expect them to calm pace  a bit, then there might be my options. No way! At km 2 Jony changed, and I do not  know what pace, but I am sure below 3min/km. Impossible to follow. From there, I was in nowhere  land, with 8kms ahead, and i did an extra effort on the  first 2 Km that I could paid. It was clear that my struggle was not going to be for victory, so the second lap (of 4) I slightly reduce my pace to recover, the third and fourth lap i struggle for the the podium, as Bryukankov was running well, he  is a strong and he normally runs progressive. I managed to keep the third, which after the Brownlees exhibition was the maximum I could battle for.
 

Some dates for reflexion after the race:

 

1 - Brownlees seem motorbike ;-)

2 – we have been doing the same run circuit  since 2008 (in previous years was slightly shorter) and Alistair ran 01.04min faster than the previous year (where he also won). I ran 51 seconds faster than the previous year and 8 seconds faster than when I won in 2008 (where the bike was 4 minutes slower).

3 - The Alistair’s final time was 1.51.06. In 2010 was 1.52.41. Being the general trend in every race, every year we notice the change that is in rhythm, each time going faster.

4 - The first 1.25 km of running was 10 seconds faster than the first in the second group!

5 - The strategy of making the race very hard in order to have people tired , which I'm doing well, it seems that the Brownlees suits better. So we have to play with other strategies in future races, to see if we can  put Brownlees on situations where they do not feel so comfortable.

6 - At the podium were three relatively common.However,  in tough races like this things change and there are many surprises, people who perform better than usual and others who perform worse.

 
The good news is that I maintain the lead in the world championship after two races, Jony nearby. Clearly, things change, each race is different and I have from my part I will work even harder, if possible, to try to beat them, the Brownlees or whoever are going to be rivals.
Next important date again at home, Still more at home, in the town where I live, the European to be held on Pontevedra. I expect a very hard weeks of work, but very motivated to do my best.

 

Again, as I began this article, thanks for the support you give me, it is really very important.

 

Javi.

Hi everyone!

Wow…what a weekend! I think we all in the Specialized family will remember the last weekend for a long time. Rasmus winning in Roth with 7h52min and Lisa and myself winning the Dextro World Championship Series in Hamburg… it was just perfect!

It was my 3rd time in Hamburg. I raced here in 2006, when I won my 2nd World Cup ever and I had probably the best race of that season. And in 2007 I got the silver medal in the World Championships beaten by a great Daniel Unger in the last 300m. Both times I was really impressed with the crowd. It´s huge! Believe me, this race is different than all the others of the series. The media talked about 150.000 people on the streets watching the race and cheering. .. the day that triathletes become soccer players. Or at least the closest we get…

So I knew what I could expect this time. Training had been going well on the weeks before the race after the problems I had at the beginning of the season with injuries. So I was looking forward to the start and to enjoy the race.

“Take your marks”… and the war starts. I didn´t have my best swim ever and after some problems at the first buoy ( I got hit and kicked pretty bad and I lost some positions) , I managed to make the first pack. Fast transition and here we are, riding 50km/h in the city center of Hamburg trying to find the moment to put on my shoes… pretty stressfull, but I love it!

After a couple of laps the group of 11 guys where I was in, got caught by a bigger one. And then by another one. This way, we started the last lap a big group of about 60 people. Tension again, everyone wants to be in the front for the transition on the narrow roads of Hamburg .

We start running and I quickly find myself well positioned right behind the local hero, Jan Frodeno , and Atkinson. The pace is not very fast at the beginning and some other athletes catch us from behind, so I decide to push a bit harder on the 2nd lap. Frodo is the only one who can keep up. We are running fast but I know if I want to beat the Olympic Champion racing at home, I will need to fly! I change the pace many times but he keeps up. We are already in the last lap and I don´t want to sprint with Frodo, so I must run away from him now or never! Easy to say it but very difficult to do it! With 2 km to go I concentrate and just run as fast as I can until the finish line. It hurts but I feel I´m running really fast. Finally, Frodo starts to drop off in the last km and I run to my first victory in the WCS, by 17 sec.

As you can imagine, I was absolutely delighted and happy after crossing the finish line. I could find my parents there, my coach Omar and Bobby with a big smile . Then I saw the other guys of the team…Jeff, Dylan… they all did a great job the days before. With them, we are sure that the bike is in perfect conditions and anything we would need, they just get it for us. Thanks guys!

The day after the race came the funny stuff. The camera from Specialized followed Mr Simon Whitfield and me riding until the Specialized truck. There, Simon interviewed me, we talked about the race the day before and other things. It was very interesting. For me Simon is one of the greatest triathletes ever and I definitely have so much respect for him. I like the stories of someone who has raced against different generations of triathletes and he has always been on the top.

But Simon is also one of the funniest guys ever, so we laugh a lot and we ended up with our bikes on two wintrainers in imitation of the video commercial of Contador and Scheleck… but saying stupid things….it was really cool.

Next stop: London, in few days. I hope to have a great race there too. I´m already looking forward to it…

Cheers,

Javi.