Terenzo has already shown he has amazing qualities. He is the first person to ever be the World Junior Triathlon and Duathlon Champion at the same time. He has also assisted with several charity events involving young people and is an inspiring speaker and a great ambassador for our country.
Terenzo Bozzone is an elite New Zealand Triathlete and in 2010 Terenzo his quest to be the worlds best Ironman continues...
2010 Rhode Island 70.3 - Providence, Rhode Island
The last race of the series was going to be my 9th race of the season and 8th race on this trip. My journey over to the East Coast from LA had a rough start with a missed flight. I managed to arrange to get on a 6am flight the next day so it was off to Santa Monica, balancing the $150US airline charge out with a one night refund on my hotel.
Arriving in Providence late Thursday afternoon saw the next couple days roll around fairly quickly. I soon realized that there were a few more top competitors racing than I had expected. I was going to have to have another great day if I wanted to come out on top...
Race morning was here and after only 3 hours sleep I was up at 3am to get ready for a 6am kick off. The start was also an hour drive away from the finish.
The start of the swim was really fast and soon we all realized that we couldn’t hold onto Kiwi, Graham O’Grady’s feet. He ended up putting a good 90 seconds on us heading onto the bike section. Graham also biked strong on the hilly course and held us off until the last section, that is most of us except Paul Ambrose who was starting to put time into us like we were kids riding BMX’s. Off the bike we were a group of five with a 3.5 minute deficit on Ambrose.
Richie and I quickly opened a little gap and were trotting along at a comfortable pace. The time to Ambrose was slowly coming down, but it was hard to calculate if we were going to have enough runway to bring him back. With Richie and I not looking around too much we were soon caught by another Aussie Tim Berkel. Berkel was running strong and putting the pressure on. Soon Richie had dropped off the new pace and I was only just hanging on. Onto the second lap we had made up 2 minutes so all going well we should catch Ambrose with a couple miles to go. I decided to make a move on the steepest hill on the course to test Berkel’s legs. He hung strong for most of the way but I managed to open a little gap that I worked hard to get bigger. Soon Ambrose was in my sights and instead of him giving up when I passed he ran with me for a mile or so and was probably puffing less than me.
All that kept me going that last half of the run was the thought of a good rest once I crossed that finish line! The fans were great and kept my spirits high and legs light pulling me through those finishing stretches.
I was relieved to get this win under my belt and one race closer to evening out my firsts and seconds for the season – 4 wins, 5 seconds and counting.
Tim Berkel came in second, Paul Ambrose third, Richie Cunningham fourth and Maxim Karit fifth.
In the womans race we Kate Major ran into the win, Catlin Snow took second and fellow Kiwi Sam Warriner who lead the race most of the day struggled the closing miles and finished third.
It has been a great season so far, thanks to everyone who has made it possible. I am now home for the next few weeks for a bit of R & R before getting ready for the big one in Kona in October 2010.
By the way, New Zealand is cold...