Christine Hemphill Talks About Being A Late Bloomer

Athletes spend most of their lives training and competing- but Christine Hemphill has seen her athletic career happen in reverse.

She had a whole corporate career before taking on a triathlon for charity - going on to take up the sport professionally.

I caught up with her to talk about her career, her work with Adventures In The Alps and the 2011 triathlon season.

- You are working with Adventures In The Alps so can you talk to me about your work there?

I guess I started to Pip just over a year ago about Adventures in the Alps, she was in the process of developing it, I was here training and developing my coaching in the Alps as well so it seemed to be a really natural fit.

She had the whole idea of camps and had the great location and I knew the area in terms of training locations -as well as knowing what triathletes need and what - so I put together the triathlon component of that.  For the other camps I just help in terms of where is a good place to take people walking or hiking or kayaking.

 - You are an athlete yourself so how have you found taking on a more coaching role?

I have a slightly different background I’m forty one and I had a whole career before I became an athlete - I came an athlete by accident.

The mini pro athletes that I compete with have spent pretty much most of their lives, from the time they were 12 and selected into, thinking that this is what they were going to do   - I had a whole career running businesses, running corporate strategies, I have worked in the mining industry and the finance industry and had a whole interesting an varied career.

As an age group athlete I found that I had some talent and thought I would pursue that for a year, gave it a year and actually did very well so I’m giving it another year (laughs).

So it came a bit out of the blue so in terms of working in a corporately role, funnily enough for me, it’s almost like going back to my last 20 years of training - organising, designing and building businesses is sort of what I do.

- You compete in the triathlon so what was it that drew you to the sport?

I have always loved to swim, bike and run - but never competitively; I would very occasionally pick a race as an excuse to train - but really I just did it for fun.

January 2009 I committed to doing a long course triathlon for charity, my nephew has been diagnosed wit muscular dystrophy and for a year I saw my sister go through this hell about what it is - there’s no cure and no treatment so it’s a short life sentence for a young child.

So it was just horrendous as she worked out what this thing was and how it was going to impact her and her son - and the whole family.

I felt totally impotent so I thought that the one thing I could do was get fit, I have always been fairly fit, and I can do a triathlon and see if I can raise some money for the research foundation - and I thought I would do a long course because people would pay more and I will do the nationals because it’s a bigger race with more prestigious so people might be more interested.

So I did the Australian long course nationals, I set myself some hurdles such as if I finish in this time then you pay me more, and I found out that I did finish in the top time and I finished in fourteenth and that was enough to qualify me for the world championships.

Now I had never meant to go to the world champs, I was just doing it as a one off, but the world champs were in Australia that year so I thought ‘why not?’ It was a chance for me to race for my country, as an amateur, so I raced the worlds, I got a coach along the way because I had no idea how to train, and ended up coming third in the world and improved my time significantly in that six months.

My coach’s fiancé lived in France, he had been in Australia for six months, and he said ’why don’t you come to France for a year and give the process a go?’ He believed that I had more to give because I was getting faster every week.

So my husband and I talked, we had always talked about going away from a year, as we were like why not? So we came here thought we would take a year off from our corporate careers and gave it a go.

I raced through the summer and had a very good year; I won the world champs last year as an amateur and they made the transition to pro - Triathlon Australia offered me a professional license because I had also had a few wins on the French circuit.

I raced my first pro race at the end of the season and came eighth, it was my first Iron Man and my first marathon  and I was lining up with these girls who had been doing it for years plus I was ten years older than most of them.

And Rob and I are really enjoying our life here so we are helping establish the Adventures in the Alps business with Pip.

- And how are you enjoying your time living and training in France?

I’m absolutely loving it - some people think that we are living the dream but on other days I’m struggling with my French or it’s snowing on me as I’m coming back from my ride or I’m out for my 3rd training session of the day and I don’t feel like jumping in the lake and getting cold.

But it is a wonderful life however it is a job and you have to work very hard to be good at it and I have this opportunity that I never thought in my life that I would have.

I have never thought of myself as an athlete and I never took the tag of athlete until I won the world champs last year - I thought I was quite good at sport but I’m not an athlete this isn’t what I do for my life - but I have realised once you are doing over 30 hours a week then this is probably what you do for your life.

But it kind of dawned on me by accident - it’s not something that I grew up to be it’s just something that happened - I feel absolutely blessed, even on those days when it’s wind and it’s cold and you are going out for your third training session I still look around at the mountains and remind myself it’s better than sitting behind a computer.

- What are your triathlon goals for 2011?

I’m off to Nice so that’s my next big race - it’s one of my two big races this year: the other is the Challenge Henley in September. So they are my two big races and around them I have done two half Iron Men so far this year - I raced at St Poulten and that was a fantastic experience as I was racing against the best of the best.

I had an ok race, it was not the fastest that I could have gone, it was my first race of the season and I was putting the race into my legs. I’m pleased that I ran the same distance two weeks later and I took a further ten minutes off it again - so I have put a few races into the legs.

- You have two kids as well so how difficult is it to juggle motherhood as well as your commitments as an athlete?

It’s easier now than it was when I was in Australia as an amateur athlete - but the reason I have got to where I am is I acted like a pro before I became one; I have always done the same with work that you act at the next level that you are currently operating at.  So I was training quite seriously and I had a four day a week job, but a very corporate job, so that was hard.

Here it is still difficult but now I have more time with the children, you can only train so many hours a week, I do about 20 hours a week of structured training; that take about 30 hours a week when you have done flexibility and all the bits around it.

But that is actually quite manageable with the Adventures In The Alps; on the weeks that I am coaching I actually use the coaching as part of my training, so I find that that works quite well - the challenge is to have the right energy when the kids are around.

It’s very easy to be exhausted when you come home from a five hour ride, Rob and I often ride together on a Tuesday then we go and pick the kids up from school, one of us tries to have the energy to go and kick a ball around or play with them or homework - that’s when it’s hard; finding the right energy at the right moment.

My little one does yoga with me and he loves doing strength training with me, he has his own little stretchy band and weights, so he is very involved. While Jackson is quite happy to sit down and read a book, he is a very different type of child, he’s happy to read or play around with what you or doing or set up his Lego next to what you are doing.

They have been great and they both love that I’m a triathlete, certainly in a French community that has helped us settle in here as they are very keen on sports in this area, so that has helped than settle in and I think it has given them a little more credibility in school (laughs).

They go to races and they are the best little support crew - Jackson does my warm up runs with me and cools down runs,  and Liam knows how to set up a transition area - they are very well raced practiced.

- For anyone who wants to get into the sport, no matter what their age, what tips would you give them?

I think the key thing with triathlon is to do it because you love the process of doing it - I love to train and that’s why I got into triathlon because I loved to go run, ride and swim as well as to compete.

I think you need to get advice, the development I got out of being coached effectively and becoming more efficient in each of the disciplines; when you are juggling three discipline it’s really important to be efficient in all three of the - especially if you are doing long course as you are out there for 9,10,11 hours.

So getting the technique honed is something you can’t do by yourself and you need support in that - having bumbled along in those three sports for a very long time having fun I have now been able to progress very quickly in those three with the right advice.

The only thing I would say is at any age and any stage triathlon is not about three disciplines it’s also about the healthy living that goes behind it - nutrition, flexibility and recovery - so those aspects can be just as important as getting you elbow just at the right angle in the swim.

So it’s a very important part of long term training, if you are training for a long course then you are going to train a lot of hours over a long period, so that recovery and the strength and conditioning so the body is kept in good condition through all of that training is absolutely critical.

You see so many people coming into the sport and having one great season and getting really fired up so the next season they ramp up their training and they are either injured and sick all the time - so that it where the nutrition, recovery and the strength and condition become critical to be able to take that extra load on the body.

FemaleFirst Helen Earnshaw

www.adventuresinthealps.com

Athletes spend most of their lives training and competing- but Christine Hemphill has seen her athletic career happen in reverse.

She had a whole corporate career before taking on a triathlon for charity - going on to take up the sport professionally.

I caught up with her to talk about her career, her work with Adventures In The Alps and the 2011 triathlon season.

- You are working with Adventures In The Alps so can you talk to me about your work there?

I guess I started to Pip just over a year ago about Adventures in the Alps, she was in the process of developing it, I was here training and developing my coaching in the Alps as well so it seemed to be a really natural fit.

She had the whole idea of camps and had the great location and I knew the area in terms of training locations -as well as knowing what triathletes need and what - so I put together the triathlon component of that.  For the other camps I just help in terms of where is a good place to take people walking or hiking or kayaking.

 - You are an athlete yourself so how have you found taking on a more coaching role?

I have a slightly different background I’m forty one and I had a whole career before I became an athlete - I came an athlete by accident.

The mini pro athletes that I compete with have spent pretty much most of their lives, from the time they were 12 and selected into, thinking that this is what they were going to do   - I had a whole career running businesses, running corporate strategies, I have worked in the mining industry and the finance industry and had a whole interesting an varied career.

As an age group athlete I found that I had some talent and thought I would pursue that for a year, gave it a year and actually did very well so I’m giving it another year (laughs).

So it came a bit out of the blue so in terms of working in a corporately role, funnily enough for me, it’s almost like going back to my last 20 years of training - organising, designing and building businesses is sort of what I do.

- You compete in the triathlon so what was it that drew you to the sport?

I have always loved to swim, bike and run - but never competitively; I would very occasionally pick a race as an excuse to train - but really I just did it for fun.

January 2009 I committed to doing a long course triathlon for charity, my nephew has been diagnosed wit muscular dystrophy and for a year I saw my sister go through this hell about what it is - there’s no cure and no treatment so it’s a short life sentence for a young child.

So it was just horrendous as she worked out what this thing was and how it was going to impact her and her son - and the whole family.

I felt totally impotent so I thought that the one thing I could do was get fit, I have always been fairly fit, and I can do a triathlon and see if I can raise some money for the research foundation - and I thought I would do a long course because people would pay more and I will do the nationals because it’s a bigger race with more prestigious so people might be more interested.

So I did the Australian long course nationals, I set myself some hurdles such as if I finish in this time then you pay me more, and I found out that I did finish in the top time and I finished in fourteenth and that was enough to qualify me for the world championships.

Now I had never meant to go to the world champs, I was just doing it as a one off, but the world champs were in Australia that year so I thought ‘why not?’ It was a chance for me to race for my country, as an amateur, so I raced the worlds, I got a coach along the way because I had no idea how to train, and ended up coming third in the world and improved my time significantly in that six months.

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