Interview: Jan Frodeno of Germany at the Start of the 2010 ITU World Championship Series

Trizone spoke to Jan Frodeno after the official launch of the 2010 Dextro Energy Triathlon ITU World Championship Series in Sydney. We asked Jan about his expectations for 2010 and what he has done to prepare for this year’s series.

Apart from recently suffering from a stomach bug Jan’s preparation this year has been much more solid than in 2009. After the high of  winning Olympic Gold in Beijing in 2008 it was not until halfway through the 2009 season that Frodena felt he was he was racing well again. This year has been very different.

Jan Frodeno lived for a while in South Africa when younger and this year spent some  time there preparing for the 2010 season and escaping  the northern winter.   Frodeno who is coached by the German national team coach, Roland Knoll trained  in South Africa with  the German triathlon team. Frodena  stayed on in South Africa  after the German team had left   and continues to work with Knoll remotely now that the season is under way.

Asked who would be  his major competition in the ITU World Championship Series this year Frodeno said “Defintely Bevan Docherty and Lareunt Vidal are going to be hard to beat this year”.   There will also be  Alistair Brownlee to contend with  but he will be out  for the first two rounds of the Series due to  a leg injury and  no one knows  what form he will be in when he returns. It will most likely be blistering. An interesting thing that Frodeno mentioned was Alistair’s ability to run his own race and not let anyone else dictate his race. This may be down to Brownlee’s youthfulness, but it is hard to argue against it.

Frodeno lived and trained in Europe last year with New Zealand’s Kris Gemmel. Gemmel’s ‘very particular’ approach to his training and preparation was something that Frodeno took away with him and hopefully he can use this to generate some more winning form and to get back to his best in 2010.

Profile

Born: 18.08.1981 in Cologne
Hometown: Saarbrücken
Profession: Triathlete
Club: Tri-Sport Saar-Hochwald
National Team Status: A
Coach: Roland Knoll (national coach)
Hobbies: cooking, eating(!), surfing, beach volleyball

Career

My sporing career began as a swimmer in Cape Town, South Africa, where I grew up between 1992 and 2004. At the age of 15 I learnt to swim, after my mum thought it might be in my best interest since surfing was fast becoming my favourite way to spend free time.

In 1999 I joined the Clifton Surf Lifesavers and started competing on the beaches of South Africa. Watching the Olympic Games 2000 in Sydney I discovered a new passion: TRIATHLON.

After my first „tri(e)s“back in S.A., I sold my bike for a plane ticket to Europe to race in the German league. Having a successful season I made the jump to the U-23 national side, which enabled me to return to Germany in the following European summers.

A silver medal at the 2004 U-23 world champs made it clear to me that I only wanted one thing: to turn pro.

Since then i moved to Saarbrücken and train up to 45 hours a week.

Facts

Height: 194 cm
Weight: 76 kg
Shoesize: 11

Armspan: 198 cm
Shoulder width: 43 cm

Body fat: 5 %

Absolute heart size: 1210 ml
Resting/Max heart rate: 36 / 205