Wow! what a season we had! I was trying to pick my favourite moment of this year and I'm torn. The sprint finish between Sarah Short and Claire Fenoughty in our season opener Duathlon was absolutely amazing! the determination of Amber Pate to leave everything she had out on course at Kingston with a storming Hailey Mason breathing down her neck for the final run lap was another. I've settled on the smiles and sense of empowerment I see in the first timers when they cross the finish line and realised "wow, I just did that!!!". It's an amazing thing to watch and is a continual source of inspiration for Jason and I here in the office. We really appreciate the power of Triathlon to act as a metaphor for personal achievement. "if I can finish a Triathlon, what else can I accomplish?" this empowerment crosses over to all aspects of life. Work, family, studies, anything! 

This year we've been reminded by just how young our sport is. Triathlons in South Australia commenced in 1981 and then in 1985 the association of Triathlon South Australia was formed and incorporated. The distinction of these two dates has never been more relevant than it is today. The first date represents events, while the second represents our community’s intent to collate a group of events and mould them in to a sport, so we can consider that our sport is just 33 years old. This relative infancy can be both our biggest challenge and our biggest strength. This year we saw some challenges with event cancellations, and while each decision by a race director to cancel had its own motivating factors, the common theme of the season cannot be overlooked. Event Oversupply.

This is where our relative youth is our biggest strength. As our board and stakeholder clubs look to form season 34 of the TriSA Calendar, we can both use our short history as a lesson, but also not be bound by historical reasoning. We're focused on continuing the strong legacy our sport has formed in a short time to provide fun, challenging events in interesting locations that will not be cancelled. Every year we spend the period between April and mid-June negotiating with race directors, securing all dates, venues, Council approvals and other relevant logistics Once we've secured all event dates, venues and management then it's over to you guys to enter. 

So enjoy your off season knowing that we're working hard behind the scenes to create a fun, innovative and sustainable sport for all ages and abilities and season 34 is rapidly forming. In the meantime, vote for your event of the year and coach of the year in preparation for our announcement of the Annual Awards Evening coming soon. 

see you at the races 

Jesse Mortensen