Thailand tour with the VIS – Recap
I have recently got back into work at the clinic in South Melbourne after a 6.5-week stint in Thailand with the VIS Triathlon program working with the athletes to manage their bodies through a heavy training block leading into two crucial races that played a part in world champs qualification later in the year in Cozumel.
In addition to the triathletes from the VIS, we also had some athletes from the National Talent Academy (NTA) in Queensland visit for some training after their first race in Gamagori, Japan.
Overall it was a fairly consistent routine for the group, with the training & treatment following a pretty typical routine for the athletes each week. In addition to the swim, bike & run training, there are typically three sessions a week in the gym focussing on various areas of weakness that have been determined to be of importance for that athlete back at home by their strength & conditioning screenings.
My role in Thailand was to ensure the boys were recovering well and helping to prepare them for upcoming training. A combination of hands-on treatment including various massage techniques, joint mobilisation, assisted stretching & dry needling was typically used and depending on the athlete, the squad would normally get between 1 & 3 sessions of some type of treatment per week with variation in treatment lengths, sometimes requiring a more extended session while other times just focussing on some mobilisation of a specific joint / region before a training session.
As I knew the group quite well, having treated the squad for six months before leaving Melbourne, the injury management process was relatively straightforward compared to travelling abroad with a substantially larger number of unknown athletes like in 2014 & 2015.
Overall it was a great experience to assist the group in Thailand. It was awesome to see that all three qualification slots for Australia have since been filled from within the training group, a great effort from all athletes, coaches & support staff involved to seal all three spots for the U23 division.
Hopefully, some more big results to come from the group later in the year at Cozumel for the World Champs!
