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After a great night at the MATCC awards on Friday, we were always going to burn the candle at both ends – so on Saturday at the end of a 7 hour drive Hazel and I upon arrival at the East Midlands hotel and after checking in both crashing out for some 40 winks, to catch up with some sleep before the awards ceremony that evening. Donning our new party clothes, we joined the host- circa 200+ attendees to celebrate what has been a phenomenal year for Triathlon in 2009. Meeting up with our Triathlon Scotland hosts, Geoff Earls president, Maisie and Richard we also renewed acquaintances with David Wilson and Elisabeth Schalenbourg of Glasgow Tri club and forged new ones with Grantown Tri with Duncan and Rebecca. Before eating the awards were kicked off by British Triathlon age group winners – this was a bit surreal as the winners seem to win a category letter – K, D etc.and there were quite alot of no shows – but noteworthy in the sense I could see how presenting this info on a spreadsheet would have been much better in holding the audiences attention! So I have e-mailed the organisers with a suggested template for 2010.......Hazel stop groaning After the grub we got into the Awards proper and just for the record the winner of the BTA official of the year award thoroughly deserved it for a truly phenomenal contribution to the sport of Traithlon.
The awards process was handled well - really about on par with Mid Argyll Tri & Cycle club process, with good resumes of action and performances of the elite Triathletes and some great video clips of action etc. Unfortunately there were some no shows and this included, alas, Chrissie Wellington and Catriona Morrison – BTA Female Long Distance Triathlete & Duathlete of the year. What was surprising was there was no “sorry couldn’t be with you video”…still this puts MATCC at the cutting edge once again However, other top stars were there and they were duly photographed by yours truly and clocked as to there location in the room for my cunning plan. For you see whilst running to the Cairnbaan on Saturday morning to collect my car……had to get the old letting a local race slip by out of the system (and also thinking of all you TFF entrants seeing you HR go through the roof whilst I prepare for a nice full breakfast)……I was thinking how do I capture this once in a lifetime opportunity to collect stars autographs….eureka…I thought bring a Mid Argyll Triathlon T-Shirt and get them to sign it – best idea I have had all year! As you will see from the photo in the "MATCC Award Gallery" Hazel is modelling our T-shirt with the following worthy signatures: Alistair Brownlee- Triathlon World Champion & BTA Triathlete 2009 Jonathan Brownlee - British Triathlon Male Junior Triathlete of the Year Helen Jenkins - British Triathlon Female Triathlete of the Year Hollie Avril – British Triathlon Female Junior Triathlete of the Year Will Clark – currently 2nd ranked in the UK as male Triathlete and winner of a number of events this year James Cracknall – Guest Speaker Yes young James entertained us with some fantastic anecdotes and insightful reflections on what it takes to complete some awesome adventure challenges – Rowing the Atlantic and Trekking to the North Pole as well as his Olympic career.
This latter reflection was particularly interesting to me and the gold medal achievement in Athens was truly amazing when you consider the crew of 4 were only formed 3 months before the race due to injury and yet they performed to the highest level to win the gold medal. His anecdotes of the British rowing world renowned coach Jurgen Drobler were real rib busters, particularly his motivational comments, which because of his dual grasp of German and English language saw some hilarious faux pais …..For instance he encouraged the Athens 4 to be like Steve Redgrave as in his words
“he is well hung like a horse”………..in fact he meant to say…he has lungs like a horse! So I collared Mr Cracknall him to sign the T-Shirt and Hazel and I got our photo taken with him and then we managed to catch up with Alistair Brownlee to get our photo with him. He was obviously carbo loading for a serious training session as he stood with a pint in hand. So a few of the awards photos in the Gallery and a great time was had by Hazel and I representing MATCC. So thanks again for the nomination, this was a great experience. Next year there is a move to get the awards up to Scotland and so might be a great opportunity for the club to book a table and we can all celebrate and party till the wee hours. Cheers Whizzer PS 15/11/09 – Tin Farm late arrival joke backfires!......So sorry that my tel. call on Sunday whilst still on the edge of Stoke circa 380 miles away to Kirsty & Matt , resulted in a delay in the start of the race whilst you waited for me to arrive…I am suitably chastened and won’t to record my profuse apologies. To hold up a race because of a jest is just wrong…sorry.
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