Recently, I had the chance to meet and train with professional Kiwi triathlete Andrea Hewitt.
Born in Christchurch, New Zealand, Andrea is considered to be one of the best short-course triathletes in the world and her career accolades include third place at the ITU World Championships 2009, as well as representing her country at the Summer Olympic Games in 2008, 2012 as well as 2016.
Session Organised By Coached
Our session with Andrea had comprised of both a run and a swim session and took place at Tanjong Beach, Sentosa. It had been organised by Coached, which is a heart rate training programme for runners and triathletes founded by former Kiwi professional triathlete Ben Pulham.
During Ben’s heyday in the triathlon circuit, he’d used to train and race together with Andrea at one stage.
Swim Session
The swim session began at 4pm. I reached Tanjong Beach Club at about 3.45pm and was introduced to Andrea soon after that.
And it had had commenced with us swimming a short lap and back, so that Andrea could have a look at our strokes and assess where we were at in terms of our swimming.
Then after that, it was basically free time for us to ask her questions. Topics that came up had included sighting, drafting and water confidence and Andrea answered everything with plenty of patience.
As well, she also demonstrated her swimming stroke to us, so that we could get an idea of some of the proper techniques of swimming from the expert.
Swim Drills and Triathlon Start
And we did a few swim drills in the water too, for instance, we practised drafting each other, firstly from the hip and secondly from the ankles, so that we could get a feel of which one was easier and more beneficial for us in triathlon and swim races.
To end the session, we practised a typical triathlon swim start, that is, how to jump into the water to jostle for a good position. 
Overall, I would say that even though open water swimming has never been my forte, I had nonetheless learnt a lot from Hewitt during the swim session. It had been a fun and engaging session, but rather tiring at the same time.
Run Segment
For the running segment, which had started at about 5pm, we began with an easy warm-up lap of a few hundred metres around the pavement within the Tanjong Beach vicinity, before Andrea then led us through several of the running drills that she practises regularly.
I must say that there had been more attendees for the Run segment than the Swim segment, as the Coached programme appears to consists of more marathoners rather than triathletes.
Run Drills
A few of the drills that we went through had included high knees, butt kicks and knee lifts.
Some of the drills are similar to the ones that we practise every week with Ben during our Coached sessions, but others had been quite new to us.
I must say that the run drills, though, had been enough to get our heart rates pumping, especially after the swimming bit.
Andrea’s Training and Nutrition
And at the same time, Andrea also fielded questions from everyone, with topics ranging from how she prepares for her races, to her training mileage.
For instance, apparently Andrea trains up to three times a day, with her weekly mileage consisting of 25km of swimming, about 300km – 500km of biking and another 120km of running, during her peak weeks.
As well, her nutrition for her races was also brought up. Unlike Ben, who strongly believes in eating a low carb, high fats diet, Andrea feels that everything should be eaten in moderation, including carbs and sugar.
In fact, the night before her races, Andrea had admitted that she enjoys indulging in a plate of pasta and tucks into bananas for breakfast on race morning.
And Andrea’s comments about her nutrition and food intake, then led to several Coached members mockingly joking to Ben that they wanted to change their diet to include more carbs and sugar!
We then ended the engaging run segment with a short cool-down walk back to the starting point, which was about a couple hundred metres away.
Ended With Group Photo
Photo: Jim Webster
The informative session then concluded with a group photo of everyone present.
I would say that I had learnt a lot from Andrea, throughout the afternoon. Many of her tips were indeed useful and applicable to not only me, but possibly everyone who had showed up.
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