Well Sunday definitely presented the toughest conditions I have ever raced in but overall I was happy with my results. Thanks to all of you for your pre and post race emails and phone calls.

As a quick synopsis ... I lay in bed awake the night before praying that the howling winds would die down. By about 5am I gave up on that hope and just prepared myself for a tough day. It was exactly that. The two lap ocean swim was the roughest I have ever done with chop and currents which spread the field out and did not leave many feet to follow. I exited the water thinking that I had had a tough but good swim and was a little disappointed when I saw the time. Nonetheless ... continued out onto the bike and was immediately drenched with a pounding rain storm and gale force winds as I headed uphill for the first 20km of the course. I gave serious consideration to pulling out at that point feeling incredibly sick from the swim and not happy with the rain and wind. Luckily a head wind out meant that we got a tail wind back and after about an hour I started feeling better. I divided three loop course into 6 segments ... uphill into headwind where I just sat in my aero bars and tried to spin my legs and then the return to town where I really tried to put the hammer down and pick up my average. I finally got off the bike in just over 5:30 and after quite a long transition (to deal with stomach issues) headed out on the marathon. By that time the sun had come out and the temperature picked up but the winds were still howling. I felt good overall on the marathon and did just over 4 hours. I ran through the finish line in 11:02 ... giving me 1st in my age group, 8th woman overall and 110th out of a total field of approximately 1000 competitors. I had hoped to finish in about 10:30 so was a little disappointed with my time until I realized that most people did 30-45 minutes slower than times from last year so staying within a minute of my finish from last year was ok. Once again ... running down that finishing chute and into the waiting arms of my parents and friends was one of the most rewarding and incredible experiences you can ever imagine. It was even more special being there to celebrate my cousin, Neil's, first ever Ironman finish in just over 12 hours to many grins and tears. Overall the highlight was being called up to the podium at the sold out awards dinner last night and standing next to my all time hero, 6 time Hawaii champion, Natasha Badmann! Undoubtably one of the most gracious and awe-inspiring women in sport today.

Next steps. Well ... I will be in South Africa for a couple more weeks with my parents and then returning to Toronto, and a very exciting new job, in April. I did win my spot to Hawaii again so that is an option to consider but at the moment my bike is going into a much overdue retirement! I can safely say that with 3 and a half Ironman races in 12 months it is time for a break!

Much love to you all.

Katherine Tweedie