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Xtri Interview: Clas Bjorling
By Betsy Delcour
9/7/2007 |
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Clas Bjorling is an up-and-coming pro triathlete who's been sidelined this past year from overtraining. But keep an eye out for him in the season ahead; he was recently named Swedish Male Triathlete of the Year (2006) after posting a scorching 8:15 at that year's Quelle Challenge Roth. Having taken some time out for recovery, he's hungry to get back in the mix. Here's what Clas had to say about growing up in Sweden, training with Gordo Byrn, and what he's done with his time off...
1. Tell us where you grew up. What was your family life like? Were you involved in sports as a kid?
I grew up in the middle of Sweden in a small town called Mockfjärd. Mockfjärd has 1500 inhabitants so it’s a pretty small place and I still live here when I’m not traveling around the world. I was born in 1978 and have one brother, he is 3 years older then me, then I have sister, she is 8 years younger then me.
I played a littler bit of soccer when I was 9-10 years old and when I was 15 I started lifting weights at the local gym and did so a lot for a few years. I also did a lot of work in the woods with my parents because we heat up our house with wood so I got some base strength from that as well, then I have been riding motocross since I was 4 years old and have got some endurance from that as well of course.
2. How did you get involved in triathlon? Did you know right away that you had talent as a triathlete?
I did some long distance running and cycling races for fun when I was 18-19 and liked that a lot and they went pretty well, but it wasn’t until I did my military service here in Sweden when I was 20 I came in contact with triathlon and did some local races for fun and I really liked the sport. But at that time I couldn’t swim freestyle at all so it’s hard to say that I saw that I had talent as a triathlete. But I slowly learned how to swim freestyle and as I did my results overall in races improved pretty fast.
I also took a year off from triathlon to focus more on running because that is where my talent really is, but I couldn’t let go of the swim and bike training because it was so much fun so I decided to go back to triathlon. During my year when I focused more on running I went to Kenya to live, train and learn from them for 5 weeks and that was a great experience. I saw that with my body type I could never be a world class runner so that made my decision to go back to triathlon easier as well.
3. Tell us about your experience at the 2001 ITU Long Course Worlds.
I had just been doing triathlon for fun for a few years and finished 3rd at the Swedish Championship the summer of 2001 behind the great triathletes Björn Andersson and Jonas Colting over the “ITU long distance”. And by doing that I got to race in the Swedish team at the ITU Long Course Worlds that happened to be over the Ironman distance that year in Denmark. So this was to be my first Ironman distance race and my first time on the Swedish team as well, both very exciting for me of course. My swim at the race was pretty slow and I exited the water as one of the last ones, but then I slowly improved my position during the bike and the run to finish in a time of 9.05 and 22nd overall out of 55 competitors I think. Rode a sub 5 bike split and ran a sub 3 marathon so I was pretty happy with my day; we also took a podium position in the team competition which was fun as well. After this race I started to see that even with a slow swim it was possible to finish pretty well overall at this distance, so I thought maybe this was something that suited me well, and I really liked the feeling of getting really tired and racing all day long.
4. When did you decide to go pro? Was it a specific race performance? Tell us about it!
I won my age group (18-24) at the Ironman Hawaii 2002 and by doing that I had achieved my goal as an AG and it was time to move on as a pro.
5. You’re a strong cyclist and an excellent runner, but the swim has been a bit harder for you. How have you improved since your earlier days with triathlon? How much do you focus on swimming during training?
When I came in contact with triathlon 10 years ago I couldn’t swim 5 meter freestyle so it has been a long journey trying to improve my swimming. And even if I have improved to a 54-55 min IM swim split it’s still frustrating because I feel like I have lost some IM wins through my swimming, and I guess that is what they say, you can’t win an IM during the swim but you can definitely lose it. So I will continue to work hard to improve my swimming but I can also get stronger on the bike so I have some work do to there as well.
6. You participated in Epic Camp in 2003. How did you hook up with Gordo Byrn and Scott Molina? What was the experience like? How did it help you with your performance at IMNZ that year (which was the end of the NZ camp)?
The year of 2002 Jonas Colting and I flew to NZ for the first time to train, and Jonas had the year before met Scott Molina at IM Brazil, I think. Scott lives in Christchurch, NZ, so Jonas had asked Scott if he knew where we could stay and Scott hooked us up with a guy in town that had bought a big house a few years earlier and had some rooms empty that we could rent, and that guy was Gordo.
That year I raced IM NZ as an AG and won my AG and finished 12th overall and qualified for IM Hawaii. Over the 2 months I was training in NZ I had learned so much from training with Jonas who at that time had much more experience than me.
The year after, so 2003, I flew back by myself to NZ to stay and train with Gordo and that year he had come up with the idea to do a camp where the idea was to train all day long, day after day, and epic camp was born. You can read more about epic camp and how Gordo first came up with the idea on www.epiccamp.com.
So the first epic camp was 2003, but since then I have participated in all the epic camps until last year when, due to my race schedule and later over-training, wasn’t able to take part in them, but I really hope I will get strong enough so I can join them next year, it’s a lot of fun at these camps.
With a 7th place overall at IM NZ 2003 I finished in the prize money for the first time and I’m sure the training and experience I got at epic camp helped me to achieve that.
7. You’ve also cycled across the country with Gordo – what made you two decide to do this? What were some memorable moments?
You have to ask Gordo more about why we did this. It was his idea and I just had the luck to be invited to join in, for several years Gordo and I were training a lot together and I think we both have each other to thank for our improvements in the sport. I will write an article about the ride across the States and post on my and Gordo’s site but you can still read the report and see pictures on www.byrn.org. That was the site we used during the trip I think.
8. 2006 was a great year for you, setting the Swedish IM time record (8:15 at Roth) and subsequently being named Swedish Triathlete of the Year. What were those experiences like?
What I didn’t know when I raced last summer was that I was just about to put myself in a big hole due to over training and a virus but back to your Q. Already the year before, so 2005, I had set a new Swedish IM distance record when I finished in a time of 8.21 and broke Colting’s 8.26 record from 2001. So last year when I raced in Roth I didn’t have the “pressure” to go break someone else’s record but even if I raced without any pressure from that I still wanted to go even faster than what I had done and with a solid run I was able to take another 6 minutes off my record from the year before which was great of course, 8.21 was pretty good but 8.15 feels a lot more safe and Colting or Björn have to go pretty fast to break that :).
It was not until just a few months ago, almost 1 year after my performance in Roth where I got to know that the Swedish Triathlon Federation had chosen me to be the Swedish Male triathlete of the year of 2006, and of course after 10 months of battling deep fatigue and all that that includes, I was very happy to get this title.
9. Unfortunately it seems 2007 is making you pay for 2006. How’s your health these days? Any plans for a late-season race this year, or are you going to focus instead on 2008?
Now it has been over a year since my last IM race (which was IM UK last year) and it’s not until the last 7-8 weeks where I have been able to come back and do some training without getting run down again, so it has been a long year but now when I’m starting to get my life back together again I can see that I have learned so much about myself by going through this and I have found a great time to work with, and all this will make me into an even better athlete than what I have been. Now we are planning my training around my rest days and easy weeks, and not the other way around. It’s nothing new but it seems like most of us have forgotten that training breaks your body down and resting builds it back up, so by knowing that we can all ask ourselves why we focus so much on training but not on resting and recovery!!
Even if my health is slowly coming back together I have to be very careful and not do too much too soon. I’m sure I could do a pretty solid late season race but instead of doing that we are focusing 100 % on building my body back up step by step and are making sure that we are building every step strong enough so it want fail later in the process. When I make it back to racing next year I still have another 10 years of professional racing in front of me if I want, so why take any risks trying to come back already this year?
10. You’re also quite accomplished in the duathlon scene. Besides the obvious lack of a swim leg, how do du’s and tri’s differ – can you say one is easier or harder than another? Do you reap benefits as a triathlete by competing occasionally in duathlons?
With my 4 Swedish Championship titles and a 5th and 7th place finish at the Zofingen duathlon, which is the Duathlon comparison to Ironman Hawaii, I do have some duathlon experience, and could I make a better living on duathlon I might have chosen that sport, but triathlon is a bigger sport and kind of more fun too, I think. But to be fair I have to say that duathlon is harder on the body. The international distance for duathlon is 10 K run, 40 K bike and 5 K run I think, that’s at least the distances we use at the Swedish championship and that was used at the ITU duathlon Worlds that I raced a few years ago.
I guess it’s a pretty much all out 1500 m swim at the Olympic distance in a triathlon race but at least you don’t have to use your arms any more that day, but in a duathlon you start out with a pretty much all out 10 K, then hammer a 40 K bike then an all out 5 K run and by the time you hit the last 5 K run your legs are starting to get pretty tired and it’s just to hang on to the finish. And at the Zofingen race its 10 K run, 150 K bike and 30 K run, all in the hills. And also in this race you open up your day with a hard 10 K running race before you slowly try to find a long distance rhythm during the bike and save something for the last 30 K hilly run. And when the day’s over you might not be so overall fatigued as after an IM distance race but your legs are feeling worse then after an IM, that is at least my experience.
I do think it’s great for triathletes to race duathlons now and then to work on their running ability. You get the feeling of a running race at the beginning but when the day is over you have also got a good cross training workout.
11. I’ve seen your nickname is “The Baron.” How’d you get that name?
It was Gordo who came up with that nickname, and below you can read his explanation that I got from him earlier when I got asked the same question.
"Why the Baron?
"A good friend of mine, John Newsom, took Clas and Jonas Colting for their first training ride when they came to Christchurch in 2002. Johno came back totally exhausted and told me... 'Jonas is strong but that young guy, he's KILLER in the hills.' Over the Kiwi summer, Clas, Jonas and I did some big training. Back then Clas would never back-off, never surrender and was always at the front. After a few rides and runs with Clas, I gave him the nickname... The Baron von Hammer. Day after day, he would punish me with a smile on his face. In fact, when training for Ultraman, my main goal was to be able to return the favour when he came back this year!
"Since that first trip, Clas has learned a lot (including patience) but I still call him The Baron because it brings back good memories of hard training."
12. What do you typically do to keep fit in the off-season?
Work in the woods, drive my motocross, snowmobiling and cross country skiing.
13. What races would you most like to compete in that you haven’t done yet? What’s your favorite race that you have done?
Oohh, that’s a hard one. Hawaii IM is not that great actually with the heat, wind and not that great scenery but it’s the Hawaii IM so I have to mention that one. Then you have races like the Auburn International ½ IM (worlds toughest) that are in an area with great scenery and overall a fun course with challenging trail running, tough bike course and beautiful swim.
Then you have the Quelle Challenge in Roth, Germany, that is a well organized race on a fast course with thousand of spectators. It’s always fun to know before a race that if you are in good shape you can go fast, and fast is most of the time also fun and that is what you get in Roth.
But all races have their charm, it all depends what you are looking for.
14. Do you have a favorite or toughest workout?
No particular workout but I really like the open water swimming in all the great lakes we have here in Sweden, a calm day, in perfect water temperature you can swim forever, this is swimming to me, no chlorine, no flip turns and not a BIG clock telling you how slow you are swimming :).
Then I really like the 2nd part of a long run on some nice trail in the hills when you have got your legs warmed up and you have found the running flow.
15. What’s your favorite non-tri-related past time? Do you have any hidden talents or hobbies?
I like to drive my motorcycle, motocross or in the winter time my snowmobile so I guess I’m pretty good at that. I’m a big fan of all vehicles with an engine.
16. What have you been up to while taking time off to recover? Have you spent most of your time in your hometown in Sweden?
Since I started training again about 2 month ago I spend a lot of time resting, stretching, massage, cooking food……. to maximize my recovery, and before that I had so little energy so I pretty much just slept, watch TV or search the internet.
I have done a few trips on my motorcycle with my non-triathlon related friends to get a mental break from everything that I have gone through.
I came back to Sweden in March after a 3 month trip to the States where I have my doctor and coach and have been here since then. Not sure when I leave again, now I’m just enjoying to get back in a training routine and the last part of the summer.
17. If you weren’t a pro triathlete, what do you think you’d do for a living?
Not sure, now I have gotten really interested in alternative medicine when I have seen that’s helped me so much. I’m also interested in chiropractic and those kinds of things too. I think the human body is very interesting and many doctors treat it like a machine, they just treat the symptoms and never look at the whole picture.
If I hadn’t been involved in triathlon at all I should probably work in some random company here in Sweden just to get a cheque each month to support my hobbies.
18. Who do you think are the athletes to watch this year at Kona? Do you have any personal favorites for the win?
Due to my recovery from overtraining I haven’t been that involved in the sport over the last year but the Germans seem to always have some strong guy in the front.
If Cameron Brown is racing Hawaii this year I think he has earned a win after finishing on the podium so many times.
19. Where do you see yourself in 10 years?
I will be 39 by then so I’m probably about to look back on my time as a professional triathlete and find some other way to make a living. I will probably live in Sweden, its fun to travel but Sweden is a great country and a perfect place to build a family, but I take one day at a time. You never know what will happen to you tomorrow/ or what your body will tell you what to do so why worry about it.
20. Do you have a website so we can continue to follow your progress in the sport?
Yes I do, it’s a pretty simple address, www.clasbjorling.com.
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