T minus 4 weeks.

The Port Macquarie half ironman (or ironman 70.3 as other parts of the world may know it) is fast aproaching. This will be my first big hitout since my return to the sport after 11 years off, sidetracked by rugby union. I can't wait! 4 weeks last Sunday and I'm now down to the last of the training micro cycles.

My return to triathlon started (properly) in late December of '08 after I got back from India and the UK. In that time have lost about 2okg, ridden about 5000km and I've swum and run many countless km. This last week, like so many before was no different, however it has left me pretty shattered. I hope I can freshen up a little so I can take advantage of a few days off this weekend.

Last Sunday was to be the first Triathlon on the Panthers tri club calender. That clearly was weather dependent and as it turned out the weather did what it so often does in Spring, a complete u-turn on the weeks prior. 80km/h wind and an air temperature of about 10C demanded a change to the race format. We Aussies find it difficult to compete in weather normally reserved for our Northern Hemisphere friends. And so after a vote, we raced a duathlon. The non-swimmers in the group have another month reprieve. It was a battle I must say, and I soon found myself in a world of hurt with the start of the race being a 5km run. They hurt so much more than triathlons. It was good hit-out and I got a chance to screw-up in a race that wasn't too important. Note to self - put shoes in the correct peddles. Damn that was embarrassing!

Wednesday again was another mid-week day of hell. Dr Phill joined me for 4 1/2 km swim, 100 km ride amd 10 km track session. The day previous we had a farewell run for Sleep Train as he headed of to Austria to compete in the world mountain running champs- Scam even graced the official BMMC run with his presence. Good luck Sleep! It is great to see you in such a purple patch.

I am so grateful for my chance to rediscover this sport. It was such a large part of my life until a friend of mine was killed out riding on the M4 in Sydney's west in 1998. That morning I got a phone call about the accident and I never rode again until recently. It took my experience in India to learn that surviving ain't living and vowed to never again fall into that trap.

Liv and I had made our way out of the stairwell in Mumbai and were making our way to our hotel. We still had very little idea what was going on. As far as we could make out someone had gone crazy in the cafe; it turned out to be so much more. We ran towards our hotel on Mumbai harbour before someone yelled out to us not to continue as there had some been some shots fired down near the harbour. We were running from one massacre to another. What the hell is going on? We took a back way to our hotel, which by now was in lock-down. The guards at gate let us in, we sat down shaken, and in a state of shock - and ordered a beer. We still had very little idea about the gravity of the situation we were in the thick of and so one could excuse us for thinking that it was appropriate to have a beer and sit, behind the locked gates, and take stock of what just happened. Then 'BOOM', a bomb went off nearby and again, we ran. This time upstairs and inside to our room. We put on the TV and then the stark realisation that we were f***ed.