Hewitt ready to step up again
In the wake of a personal tragedy, Andrea Hewitt has had to call on all her resilience as she prepares for the Rio Olympics. Tony Smith reports.
Star New Zealand triathlete Andrea Hewitt is looking ahead confidently to the Rio Olympics – and beyond – as she adjusts to life without her fiance and coach.
The 33-year-old Cantabrian confirmed she is likely to keep racing on the world circuit after attending her third Olympics because she still loves the sport after a decade at the top.
Hewitt, a private individual, is still not ready to talk publicly about the loss of life partner, Laurent Vidal, who died suddenly of a heart attack at their home in France last November, aged 31.
Vidal, who finished fifth at the 2012 London Olympic Games where Hewitt was sixth in the women’s race, was her coach for six years and was highly respected throughout the triathlon world.
But the resilient Hewitt is enjoying the support she is getting from new head coach Chris Pilone, who ‘‘Laurent respected for his knowledge of running’’. She also draws on the experience of John Hellemans, ‘‘who coached me from when I started in triathlon in 2005, through to the Beijing Olympics’’.
Being back around family and friends in Christchurch since ‘‘the week before Christmas’’ has also helped her. ‘‘That’s the best part of coming home.’’
Hewitt spoke warmly of ‘‘handing my nephew, Dylan, who’s seven, a medal’’ for competing in his first Weetbix triathlon – an event she contested once herself.
‘‘When I came back to New Zealand, straight away I had people around me all the time to train with me. A lot of people offered to help.’’
Hewitt is enjoying the camaraderie of training partners, including Dutch triathlete Maaike Caelers, who has been coached by Hellemans since 2010, Maddie Dillon, and fellow Olympian Ryan Sissons, another Pilone protege.
French triathlete Anthony Pujades, ‘‘who Laurent was coaching’’, is also training with her in Christchurch until April. She trains with cycling groups and works out at the pool, under the watchful eye of long-time swim coach, Roly Crichton. Her swimming colleagues include Paralympics champion Sophie Pascoe.
Hewitt has kept busy planning her Rio buildup, which features a series of races, including a World Cup duel with double world champion Gwen Jorgensen in New Plymouth on April 3.
She says the American ace, who has a Kiwi-born coach Jamie Turner, ‘‘is there already’’, getting ready for the big race.
Six days later, Hewitt will go to Gold Coast for an ITU World Triathlon Series race on April 9 before heading home to Christchurch ‘‘to train for a month’’ until she leaves for a race in Yokohama in mid-May.
‘‘I’ll do World Triathlon Series races in Leeds, Stockholm and Hamburg [in June and July] and then races in Geneva and France.’’
Hewitt will again base herself in the south of France, in Aix-enProvence, Pujades’ home region. ‘‘All the people I’m training with here will be my training partners in France, as well.’’
Pilone will ‘‘be with me at every race’’.
Hewitt says the new coaching arrangement is working well. ‘‘Chris comes to Christchurch once a month to work with me’’.
The pair’s paths first crossed in 2006 when Pilone was the New Zealand team coach at the 2006 Melbourne Commonwealth Games, where Hewitt won a bronze medal.
‘‘Laurent talked to Chris because he felt he had a lot of knowledge about running, so he as always in the mind to be a good triathlon coach.’’
Pilone became coaching director at Auckland’s Bays Athletic Club, but he continued to mentor triathletes Sissons and Kris Gemmell through to the London Olympics, and is working with Sissons again now.
The Aucklander was the logical person for Hewitt to turn to when she found herself unexpectedly in need of a new coach.
Hewitt is experienced enough now to know the ropes – ‘‘I know what my basic training is, it’s not too technical’’ – but she still needs and values the services of an elite coach.
She is following ‘‘the same season plan [I did] with Laurent’’, but with ‘‘a few tweaks’’ and has her training diaries to fall back on.
Pilone and Hewitt decided she should skip the first World Triathlon Series race of the season in Abu Dhabi in early March because it was ‘‘quite a long trip’’. She competed there last year, but ‘‘only because I wanted to see my sister’’, Sara, a former New Zealand water polo representative, who lives in Dubai.
But they felt Hewitt could benefit from a race after a training block at Snow Farm, near Wanaka, so she entered the 5000m at the national track and field championships in Dunedin.
It was her first time ‘‘running around a track’’, apart from a couple of events at school, and she found the race was ‘‘more tactical than going for times’’.
She ‘‘didn’t know what to expect’’, but led from the front in the early stages before settling for second place behind highly rated Hamiltonian Camille Buscomb.
Hewitt raced in New Brighton club colours because ‘‘Chris said I’d have to race in a Bays [Auckland] bib if I didn’t’’.
Rio has been a long time in the planning for Hewitt, who was the first New Zealander to qualify.
‘‘When the criteria was set we had two years to qualify and you had to have two podiums [top three-placings] to meet the A criteria. I did it after three races.’’
That relieved a lot of potential pressure.
‘‘It meant I still had to perform, but I didn’t have to tape for any of these races at the start of the this year and I could build to the Olympics.’’
Hewitt and Sissons, who achieved the qualifying standard at Abu Dhabi last week, are the only Kiwi triathletes to have met the qualifying criteria for Rio so far.
It will Hewitt’s third Olympic campaign after finishing eighth in Beijing and her sixth placing at London.
She feels she is in good shape for Rio. ‘‘In the last 18 months, I’ve been the most consistent I’ve ever been. In the last year I had top eight finishes in every single race. I’m not getting slower. I’m improving each year and I feel like I’m getting better.’’
When she started, swimming was her strongest discipline because she had been a competitive pool swimmer and surf lifesaver.
Her cycling skills improved quickly and her running has taken off, although, her swimming has suffered a little.
She broke her collarbone when she crashed off her bike during a race in China in 2014 and had to have a plate inserted, which hindered her swimming.
Still, Hewitt finished second on the World Triathlon Series circuit, behind Jorgensen. It was her second silver medal in the series and she also has three bronzes.
Hewitt, who turns 34 in April, says she can draw on her experience of past Olympic campaigns – ‘‘things that worked and things that didn’t work’’.
‘‘Training together, as group, is also going to help.’’
But there will also be some changes. ‘‘I’ll be staying in the Olympic village for the first time.’’ In Beijing and London, she stayed closer to the triathlon venues, but it is safer to stay in the village at Rio.
Hewitt’s race is ‘‘ on the second last day’’ of the Olympic programme and she will arrive in Rio ‘‘a week before, when the Games are halfway through’’.
She’s not fazed by the Zika virus risk, saying she was in Rio for a test event last August ‘‘and I didn’t see any mosquitos at all’’.
‘‘They gave us insect repellent and extra vitamins to boost our immune systems, but no-one got sick.’’
The water quality in the section of the Copacabana Beach where the triathletes swim is probably better than the stagnant water in the Rio lakes.
Hewitt says her focus is on producing her best performance in Rio and she is grateful that Jorgensen will have the favourite’s mantle.
In London, four years ago, Hewitt had the number one ranking and had pole position on the swimming pontoon.
But she said no-one was the out and out favourite then – unlike Jorgensen, who has won back to back world titles, in 2016.
Hewitt loves the Olympics ‘‘because of all the other sports involved’’ and the opportunity to represent New Zealand on sport’s biggest stage.
In 2012, Hewitt and Vidal both had a shot at making an Olympic podium in London. Both fell tantalisingly short. Hewitt ‘‘ran the first 5k with the leaders’’, but finished sixth.
Vidal used to claim he had the better day, because he finished one place better in a race where the French team claimed fourth, fifth and 11th spots.
London was one of the highlights of his career, Hewitt said, ‘‘along with being the French champion three times’’.
Four years on, she has a chance of crowning her career with an Olympic medal, but, with World Triathlon Series races in Canada and Mexico in September, Rio’s unlikely to be her sporting swansong.
‘‘In the last year I had top eight finishes in every single race. I’m not getting slower. I’m improving each year and I feel like I’m getting better.’’
Andrea Hewitt