Traveling man Chris McDonald
Australian Ironman athlete Chris McDonald has lightened up his racing schedule this year as he returns this weekend to defend his 2008 Ironman Wisconsin title. The 31 year-old from Albury – on the border of Victoria and New South Wales – moved to New Zealand and opened up a water proofing business during while the industry was booming, and earned the right to represent New Zealand. However, he maintains he is true blue kangaroo and was born, raised and pays allegiance to Australia. We talked with the strongman from Oz earlier this week.
Slowtwitch: You race throughout the calendar year. How do you break up your seasons?
Chris: At the end of the Northern Hemisphere season I take a couple of weeks easy. I always put more focus into the Northern Hemisphere season than I do the Southern Hemisphere one. I try to have two short off seasons rather than one long one in the winter. I’m able to race year-round and never get that out of shape. I always keep fit year-round but the Southern Hemisphere season is racing off base miles.
ST: How do you gauge your performance in the Southern Hemisphere?
Chris: When I’m back home I only train with myself or with my wife. I go on one intense, 40 km group ride, each week. That is the only intensity during the week.
ST: Where do you spend your time when you are back in the Southern Hemisphere?
Chris: I spend most of the time in Albury but some time in New Zealand since I race the Challenge Wanaka in January. Come to North America in March and then spend most of the year here (in Boulder, CO) and then go to Germany in June through Challenge Roth (early July).
ST: You have won two WTC Ironmans but you make a good living off the Challenge races. What is the difference between the two organizations in terms of race production?
Chris: WTC have a huge market share brand that have the world championships that will always be theirs. That is a huge draw for their events with the Ironman slots. People want that elusive Hawaii spot. With the Challenge events it is a completely different feel. There is no prize at the end of the tunnel like with the Ironman slots but the feel of the race is super friendly and it is hard to describe but it has a family feel to it.
The race organizers are at the swim start, on the bike course, and helping out at aid stations but the Challenge events are becoming huge corporate events. Their flagship race, Challenge Roth, is live on prime time TV. The Prime Minister comes to the race, but it does have a grassroots feel in that each of the racers – from first place to last place – is greeted by Felix, the race director at the end of the race.
Felix puts a focus on getting to know people by name and more than just being a number. That is the case whether you finish first place or last place. People who do the race once, they go back year after year after year because of that feel. In Europe, triathlon is a big deal. They make it a professional show, they have a good media conference, they have athlete signings in malls, and people show up to these. They have a party after the race and there are lines of people, aged 5 to 50, waiting in line to get autographs from the top professionals. It is the same every year.
ST: You book your return ticket home to make sure you attend the volunteer party?
Chris: This is a big deal that is a formal event and goes all night.
ST: Are the race organizers attempting to mimic this feeling at Roth at their other venues around the world (Wanaka, Barcelona, Copenhagen, etc)?
Chris: Felix picks his race directors carefully who has the right feel and can recreate the same feel as Roth but in their home country.
ST: You spend the early portion of your North America season in Tucson. How was your pre triathlon season prep?
Chris: I raced Wanaka and got the win on the 19th of January. It was a good start to the year. I did a couple of halfs but my next major race was going to be Roth. The way that race is raced, it is much more aggressive on the bike. There are portions where you are truly redlining it on the bike. You go with whoever is trying to put the hurt on at that particular time. I raced the Tour of Tucson, then a couple of crits, and then the Tour of the Gila to mimic those efforts.
ST: You had an unfortunate happenstance at Tour of Tucson.
Chris: I was at the wrong place at the wrong time. I had my brand new Wilier road bike and had just taken it out of it’s box and built it up the day before the race. I cracked both rear stays and eight spokes out of a new Zipp powertap wheel. I tore off some skin but luckily didn’t break any bones. I was out of the race though.
Then I did the Arizona crit championships in Phoenix and won that. It was fun. I won off the front in triathlete style!
I picked the Tour of Gila because of its mountain style. At Roth, even though it is a very fast course, it is also very hilly. The top guys really hit the hills hard so I wanted to mimic that in a bike race. It was five stages and I got a great boost in bike fitness because of it. I didn’t have the race I wanted in Roth but that stage race prepared me well for the bike portion.
ST: You’re known for picking out the hardest courses. One of your wins was at the Superfrog Half on the Navy SEALs base.
Chris: Superfrog was awesome. I said to Marilyn when I got home if I was American and 20 years old after being there, I would want to be a SEAL. I was totally fired up by it. The race director took me on a tour of the boats and showed me the little subs they go into the ocean with. That course was pretty much as tough as it gets.
I’ve raced World’s Toughest, Savageman and Superfrog, which are probably three of the hardest races around. The other two races have really hard bike courses but Superfrog had a very hard run course. I would go back to this one again and again. Not knowing race director Moki Martin at all beforehand, but hearing the myths and stories about him and his SEAL service, he was very inspirational. If you are in California or even if you have to fly into it, I would suggest getting to this race.
ST: What did you do the week between your second place at Louisville and Wisconsin last year? Did you know all along you were going to do both races?
Chris: I was entered into both races and I think a lot of people who saw my name on both entry lists thought Wisconsin was on there in case Louisville went horribly wrong. I had the full intention all along to race both, but really wanted to win both. I lost my head a bit in Louisville and didn’t hold one stitch back on the bike. It was extremely hot out there and I blew myself up. I crossed the finish line and my wife was there and I said I didn’t think I could do Wisconsin and it was the dumbest idea I had ever had. She said to give it a day and in between the two races I did six hours of movement. I rode a 40 minute spin the next day and then 30 or 40 minute spins and 20 minute spins and didn’t run a step between the races.
On race day in Madison, it was a complete surprise to lead out of the water and I came off the bike with eight to ten minutes lead. When I was riding up the helix into T2, I thought I was going into a five-hour marathon. The first mile of the run in Wisconsin is downhill and I got into a rhythm so I just rolled with it. On the first out and back I saw second place and he was still seven minutes back and then I started getting splits and I was never losing any time. These positive affirmations kept me motivated. It was an utter shock to win.
ST: Did the base miles you did earlier in the year with Brett Sutton’s squad play a factor into your performance at these back-to-back Ironmans?
Chris: No particular training day was harder than one of these race days but I had done several long training days. I knew the swim and ride wouldn’t be hard to back up so the question remained if I could make it through the marathon. I had done back to back long runs of nearly marathon distance so I had that wired into my system so my body was able to cope with the recovery. Because I blew up and ran slower in Louisville, I was forced to take it back a step and didn’t completely work myself into the ground.
ST: After Wisconsin you did Arizona.
Chris: I did the Soma Half a month after Wisconsin and got greedy. It was the best half of my life where the swim, bike and run all felt good. I should have called it quits on the season right there. At the Ironman in Arizona, from the very first pedal stroke I knew that was a bad idea. That’s when I took a small off-season and went back to Australia. There are a few local roadies but I was able to hide away and get some good recovery.
ST: Your approach to your 2009 season has been different to last year.
Chris: Totally different. In 2008 I raced six Ironmans and this year I did one early, took a break, raced a couple of halfs, put a focus on Roth. I didn’t have the finish I had hoped for but still walked away with a lot of confidence from that race. Now I have tried to prepare myself for Wisconsin so I can defend my win there.
ST: Are you thinking past Wisconsin?
Chris: I will go to Kona so I am not expecting miracles. I would rather race another Ironman one week later than one month later. I did the race twice as an age grouper but I am going back to do some recon. I want to be in the atmosphere, take part in the race, and it will be very low pressure.
ST: What is your favorite place to train?
Chris: The best place in the world to run is Christchurch in New Zealand. It is all mountainous trails. They are all mountain bike trails but there are hundreds and hundreds of kilometers of them. My favorite place to bike ride is a coin flip between Switzerland and Boulder. For all around training, we have everywhere in the world to choose from, and Marilyn and I always end up back in Boulder. This place has the best options to swim, bike and run.
ST: Do you have any plans for your off-season?
Chris: I grew up skiing in Albury, Australia. We only have a 10 week season but I haven’t skied a lick since 2002 so I would like to get onto the mountain this winter. It would be fun to do some nordic skiing and also race some cyclocross just to do some other sporting events that aren’t my job.
ST: You got a late start in your professional racing. What did you do before that?
Chris: From ages 11 to 21 I played field hockey, which I know is a girl’s college sport in the US, and I played at a national level for the last three years for both Australia and New Zealand. From ages 21 to 24 where I didn’t do anything but party.
I have two older brothers and one of them did Ironman Australia so I thought I would try one out. In 2002 I did a sprint distance, a half and then a full Ironman. Once I did an Ironman I knew that was what I wanted to do. I still had a business in construction and was working full time so it was in 2004 I placed 7th at Ironman New Zealand so that was my que to start racing full time. I met Marilyn then and we flew back to North American and have come back ever since.
ST: Your wife Marilyn was also a professional triathlete – and 2004 winner of Ironman Malaysia. What is she doing now?
Chris: She is racing bikes full time now after spending four frustrating years attempting to improve her swim but getting nowhere.
ST: She had a unique background working with horses. Is there any cross over as she works with your training plans?
Chris: She was in stadium jumping and did that from when she was 9 years old until I met her. She was a professional from 18-24 years she rode like a jockey and rode jumping horses. She had her own stable and was training her own and also other people’s horses.
ST: Do you bounce ideas off her in terms of your own training?
Chris: When I first started, Scott Molina helped me right up until the beginning of 2008. Then I trained under Sutton for the year but because of the restructuring of the team it didn’t work this year. Since August last year Marilyn has been the eye over my training. She puts a plan together and then we both talk about it and put a plan together leading into each race. Having trained animals for a long time she has an ability to look at an athlete rather than a personality. A horse can’t talk back to you so she had to figure out what was wrong with it. She has the same ability with humans.
ST: One of your sponsors is Coffees of Hawaii, so one might naturally be curious, what your favorite kind is?
CM: Kona. The Kona is best. A good, strong brew in the morning to get things moving. I have a coffee every morning. Wake up and flip the coffee maker on.
ST: Is that a ritual since the bakery business days? Those must have been hellish hours?
Chris: It was anywhere from midnight to 2 am was the start time through 10 am to mid-day. To be honest, I didn’t drink too much coffee then. Marilyn was a heavy coffee drinker so it started then. When I met her, she wanted to go for a coffee, so I started drinking coffee.
ST: We all love to know about numbers here at Slowtwitch. Do you aim for a certain wattage number during the bike portion of an Ironman?
Chris: If I am hitting 300 then I think I will have a good day. In a half Ironman it is pretty much as fast as I can go. My riding pace during an Olympic distance and a half Ironman are pretty much the same. If I’m looking down and seeing 340 or 350 than I am happy.
ST: Who are your picks to win Kona this year?
Chris: Craig Alexander and Chrissie Wellington.
ST: Who is the Ironman athlete currently with the most talent?
Chris: Eneko Llanos and Chrissie Wellington.
ST: Who is the greatest of all time?
Chris: Greg Welch and Erin Baker
ST: Who is the greatest Australian sportsman?
Chris: Greg Norman
ST: Who is your favorite athlete outside of triathlon?
Chris: George Hincapie. He is selfless, application to sport for so many years, most underrated cyclist in the world.
ST: How did you get this nickname Big Sexy?
Chris: I’ve had so many nicknames throughout my life but everyone either called me Macca – a very common nickname in Oz – or Big Fella. Obviously, there is a very successful Macca already in this sport, but this was my nickname throughout my field hockey years, and Brett Sutton was calling me Big Fella over and over again. I was trying to drop this so he started calling me Big Sexy. When I was part of TBB last year, no one called me Chris, only Big Sexy.
For more information on Chris, go to trimacca.com
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