The majority of April was spent quietly training and revising, in preparation for the upcoming triathlon and exam seasons. I had no races planned until the end of the month, and so enjoyed a good few weeks of solid hard work, before things started to take off.
At the end of April I travelled to Quarteira, Portugal for my first European Junior Cup. I was very excited for this race, as it featured a very strong field, and would provide the opportunity to race against many of the best juniors in Europe and would give me a good idea of my progress over the last month since my last race. Unfortunately I felt a little under the weather a couple of days before the race, and so did my best to recover in time to race, but unfortunately I only felt worse as the race drew nearer, and so I was forced to withdraw from the race the night before. This was a very tough decision to make, as I felt I may still have just been well enough to race, but with the qualifier for the European Championships two weeks after, I decided it would be better to take the time to recover as quickly as possible to ensure I reached the qualifier in Llanelli in the best shape possible.
Despite the disappointment, I have refocused, and am now looking forward to the European Junior qualifier on the 11th May, where 3 junior boys will be selected to race in Weert, Holland at the end of May.