2021 Aquathlon ORIGIN Athlete – Tanya Lee-Parker

1. How did you train and get prepare for Aquathlon ORIGIN at this current situation (having social distancing measures in place)?

I have found that the social distance measures for training have not been so bad. I usually run on my own or just with one other person, mostly because of my work schedule. 

For swimming, I train with the Masters team at Singapore Swimming Club. This means we are adhering to the stipulations the club has to put in place. So mostly we only have 3 to a lane and some of us have to swim long courses while others do short courses depending upon how many turn up to training. 

My coach has also been super supportive and each time the “goal posts” changed we’d chat and re-evaluate and re-focus. This has helped me a lot to stay focused and 🤞be ready for the start line on Saturday. 

2. Due to the rolling start, the Aquathlon format is very much like a time trial format.

Does this change your race strategy? How or why not? 

The rolling start is not an issue for me as I am used to it from doing 70.3 races where this is implemented. For someone like me – being a fairly good swimmer the rolling start is advantageous as we only have a few people on the line with us and we don’t have to worry about dragging a pack along. Which then means we can have a pretty clean start and swim, it also means that I don’t tend to swim over quite so many men who think that:

  • Because I’m a female I must not be a good swimmer
  • Because I’m old (55 about to turn 56) I must be slow

What is your target?

My target is to, hopefully, win my age group. Also, I would like to try and make it top 10 overall/  The latter goal may be very challenging, but I will try and run as hard as I can, as this is my weakest of the two legs. Although I’m happy with wherever I come overall, as I have no clue what “young athletes” are out there and if they are ready and raring to go. 

3. What are you looking forward to for this upcoming Aquathlon ORIGIN event?

I look forward to being able to do a live race with other people,and the competition. I love being in a competition, it brings out the best and worst of me. The best because I can go as hard as I can and the worst because from every race there is something that could maybe have been done better. 

However, I am mostly looking forward to seeing my friends who are doing their first EVER event. I can’t wait to be out on the course supporting them while I’m also racing. I’m so proud of the courage they’re taking to step outside their comfort zone and train, refocus, train some more, refocus more and now they can finally see their hard work come to fruition on Saturday. 

I thank you Metasport for persevering in bringing us this opportunity in such an unprecedented climate. 

4. What is the SG Women’s Triathlon Club? 

The SG Women’s Tri Club is a group of like minded ladies of all levels of abilities. We get together to do training sessions -swims, runs, bikes and enjoy each other’s company at the same time.  We have about 17 different nationalities amongst us and of course all ages. From young “spring chickens” to oldies like me. As well, brand new to the sport and/or exercise to those experienced over all distances.

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