Parkinson Has Come A Long Way To Achieve World Championship Status
Connie Parkinson is one of close to 300 New Zealanders ready to compete at the World Triathlon Championships on the Gold Coast of Australia this week and like so many of the 300 about to don the silver fern in age group racing, she has her own unique story to tell.
Five years ago Aucklander Connie could run 3km – but only at a stretch; she could swim breaststroke but had never tried freestyle and had not been on a bike since she was a kid.
But a twisted knee in a skiing accident changed all of that as Parkinson looked to find new ways to keep fit and active – her weekly ballet classes were now very much on the backburner.
Inspired by her Daughter’s participation in a Weet-Bix Childrens Tryathlon, Connie decided to give the sport a go.
“I signed up for a Try-a-Tri event, to be held in December 2004 – 100m swimming (which you could walk, if you really wanted to, and I did walk most of it on the day), 10km biking and 2km running,” said Parkinson. “I took some freestyle swimming lessons, dusted off an old, very heavy bike and did a bit of running.
“Amazingly, I won the event for my age-group! I can’t remember, there were probably only a handful of people in my age-group, but nevertheless I got an email congratulating me from Barry Larsen (then Triathlon New Zealand high-performance coach), whom we had met at a family triathlon event just prior.
“I was away, little knowing just how much the sport had ‘hooked’ me!”
Hooked indeed as the five years since have seen Parkinson move from nervous first time participant unable to swim 100m to an age group representative at the World Championships, competing in the women’s 45 to 49 category on the Gold Coast this weekend.
It has been a journey full of ups and downs, tears and smiles and plenty of hard work and fun. But it seems 48 year old Parkinson wouldn’t have missed it for the world.
“Triathlon has taken over my life! Like osmosis it has infiltrated and seems to dictate every single thing I do; when I go to bed, when I wake up, what and when I eat, what I drink (or don’t drink as the case may be!). It impacts on my roles as mother (of two teenage kids, one of whom is also a keen tri-athlete and competing at the World Championships in her age-group, the other a keen tennis player, among many things) and wife my husband took some time to come around to understand what on earth I was doing – and why, but I think he is quite proud of me now!”
Five years and progress through the variety of beginner, short and then standard distance triathlons later and Parkinson found herself qualifying for the World Championships at the 2009 Contact National Triathlon Championships, ironically with Barry Larsen now as her coach. Her reward is a race suit with the silver fern on and a start line appointment this weekend on the Gold Coast.
“One can never truly predict the future, but I am pretty certain that somewhere in my future lie some more triathlons. I have had some amazing experiences, made some great friends (tri-athletes are generally really nice people!) and I have even begun coaching a few people myself. I think the osmosis is irreversible. And that’s good!”