Pro Q&A With Bermuda’s Tyler Butterfield

TM: When did you get picked up by Team Slipstream?

TB: I wrote one Pro Team, Jonathan Vaughters and Slipstream (at the time it was TIAFF CREFF) but it was the only team I reached out to. In my mind, I told myself if they say yes I would be a professional cyclist but if they say no then I am going to go back and do long course triathlon. Vaughters said yes and gave me more of a salary than I ever made in triathlon and more than I made on the amateur team.

TM: Looking back now, why do you think he selected you?

TB: I met him at Interbike and he told me racing in French amateur bike races was not an easy lifestyle. My second year I got third in a race he did when he was an amateur and I wore the yellow jersey at Tour of Guadalaupe and actually sent him the letter while I was in the yellow jersey, which is a 2.2 UCI race, where a few older professional racers go and race. He had raced the amateur races and knew them.

I did cycling for two more years with Slipstream, went to Australia for a winter of training, but I came over from one of the most structured amateur team, onto a first year Continental team in their first year over in Europe. They had a bunch of young guys, had just switched over from TIAFF Cref to Slipstream, and worst of all I wasn’t riding well. Because Continental American teams could only do amateur races in the US and not in Europe, we would sometime go six weeks without racing. My first pro race was a French Cup race and next was Circuit de Sarthe. We were blood tested everyday as part of the passport program, and I told them I felt something was wrong, but they just said that maybe my white blood cell count was a little high, but to not worry that I was likely tired from training. I think a lot of my teammates thought I wasn’t very good.

Eventually I flew back to the US for my brother’s wedding and got blood tested and found out I had giardhea. The first half of the year I raced with giardhea, took a bit of medication, it killed everything in my stomach, and then I was back to normal. I went to Switzerland, where Nikki was racing, and was hit by a car and broke my collarbone, so it was just a bad year for me.

It was my first year in Europe and me and my roomate, an Australian, were the only two on the team who stayed in Europe all year long. Most of the others went back to the US and got some more racing in their legs. It was a bad combination. I would never change it thought because I got experience and was even able to race in the Tour of Belgium next to Tom Boonen. That was comforting to be able to hang with the bunch.

TM: At what point did you figure out that cycling was not the sport for you?

TB: In triathlon there was no one running 27 minutes off the bike and I knew I was capable of running the 1:10 you needed to run in a half marathon. If you could swim and bike with the rest of the guys and then do that then you can win races. It is very rare now that you find someone who is a dominant swimmer and biker and capable of holding on during the run.

TM: Have you lost any motivation on the bike after your years of only cycling?

TB: Not at all. From day one I knew if I stopped racing my bike I would try to ride just as much because I loved riding. Even though I raced as a professional biker, cycling was still my weakest sport in a triathlon. My first two long course races in 2009 I had the fastest run in one of them and, in the second race, only Craig outran me.

TM: Did you miss running while you were cycling?

TB: My last year in cycling, some days if I didn’t feel like getting on the bike, I would go for a run.

TM: Did your coaches get mad at you?

TB: They didn’t know. They would not have been impressed and would have said it was better to do double rides.

TM: What are your goals in triathlon?

TB: I want to get a top ten in Hawaii within the next ten years at least once. If I can get the level of my bike up to standards, I think I can run with the best of them.

TM: You finished Ironman Cozumel with a 2:52 finishing marathon last November but really opened some eyes with your 1:07 finishing half-marathon at US Pros in April.

TB: I wanted to do the race in Texas because I have family down there and I wanted to do one or two halves that Lieto was in. He is a tier one triathlete, and he has to race with a target on his back. I wanted to see how I compared to him in a race situation on the bike. Even though I ran a 1:07 and got seven and a half minutes back on him, he put ten minutes into me on the bike.

TM: Had you been putting in bike miles or was your goal only to run fast?

TB: That is a hard question and one of the reasons I don’t work well with coaches. All winter I worked on my swim and bike and only did two key runs each week. When I got off the bike in that race and Nikki said I was ten minutes behind Lieto, I was shocked. She was laughing at me because I told her I wanted to move up from a tier two to a tier one athlete as my goal this season. I knew I wasn’t biking great eventhough I had been riding a lot I didn’t feel great on the bike.

I got off the bike and I took off as fast as I could right up to my threshold pace. I went out hard and caught a few guys who had passed me out on the bike course and I kept running hard. Because it was a windy day, there were people out there I kept catching and it was those people in front that gave me something to keep chasing all race. The last person I caught was Paul Amey and he was running a quick time himself. I couldn’t believe I was actually catching him because I remember thinking he looked like he was really running fast.

In the end I was pleased because the guys in front of me were all good athletes. I’m an American citizen (Tyler’s Dad is from Bermuda, his Mom is from Denver, Colorado) so I wanted to do well since it was the US Pro Championships. Having only an average bike really gave me the fuel and fire to run fast. I knew I was running well so I thought I ran a 1:11 half, but when I saw the time I thought ‘WOW’.

TM: Do you think the course was short, and if so, how fast would you have run on an accurately measured course?

TB: I think I would have run a 1:10 because I remember last year in Clearwater when I thought I was running a 1:15 and finished with a 1:13.

TM: What is coming up for you the rest of the year?

TB: Everything from now on is directed towards Kona. This year I will do five blocks of three weeks, two weeks on and one week off and also try a bigger volume block. I want to try it early after nine weeks so I can build my power in the final six eight weeks if I need it.

I raced Philadelphia the other week (Tyler finished third in the run-bike-run format in the June 26th Toyota Cup Series Race) because I like doing the short races in order to keep some of the top end speed. I think one of the reasons I did well in Texas was because I raced an ITU race in Mexico the week before, so the running almost felt like it was in slow motion by comparison. There is a place for these speed races because if I am running a 32 minute 10k in a short race, then to run 30 seconds slower per mile in a longer race doesn’t feel that fast. I’d like to stay sharp, but also Philadelphia Insurance Companies is a sponsor of mine. There is a race in Bermuda that is put on by my main sponsor Tokio Re-Insurance and those two companies are affiliated so it was a great one as a hit out and for my sponsors too.

FILED UNDER: Features TAGS: Bermuda triathlon / Competitor Radio Kona / Cycling / professional triathlete / Triathlon / Tyler Butterfield

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