Australian Triathlete — December 2017

AustrAliAn triAthlete | 29

annabel luxford

“Early on I decided on three metrics

and continually evaluated them.

Was I making a living from the sport

where I was financially independent

and debt free? Was I consistently

ranked in the Top 10 in the world? And

was I still enjoying triathlon? The AIS

support helped but the first two

metrics kept me honest and realistic.

I didn’t want to be going around

making up the numbers and I couldn’t

afford to be doing so.”

“My motivations are still much the

same - to consistently be one of the

best long course athletes in the world

and to make a living from the sport.”

Annabel is most certainly intriguing.

There is a slight dichotomy between the

clear performance objectives, which she

states so adamantly here and her later

assertions on what is important to her

in sport.

“I’m looking forward to seeing

where that takes me. I’ve never been

an athlete to say I want to win this and

that. It really is about the process.”

Perhaps there is a miscommunication

of term or an error in context. I think that

Annabel (understandably) plays her real

cards quite close to her chest. A lifetime in

competitive sport teaches hard lessons.

It is a fragile career, easily ended by ill

circumstance and no result is ever

guaranteed to anybody - irrespective of

talent, skill or desire. Bella is rightly

reticent to claim that success or failure in

sport revolves solely around victory but

her attention to the importance of

‘process’ in sport somewhat conflicts with

her initial assertion of never wanting to

merely ‘make up the numbers’.

Bella has got more cautious as she has

matured in the sport. The injury struggles

and the fatigue of living continually from a

suitcase, and at the whim of results and/or

sponsors are difficult to do for consecutive

years. In 2015, in a quest to ease her

burden of worry for the future, Bella began

balancing full-time Ironman training with

a three-day-week corporate job based in

Melbourne. Her role did not lack

responsibility - a ‘Content Optimisation

Specialist’ in the digital team at National

Australia Bank [NAB].

Balancing corporate city life and

full-time Ironman training is some feat, as

age-groupers know. Bella is not the only

professional athlete to have ever taken on

against each other. Bella is still best

friends with some of these women,

meshed together by the experiences and

endeavours as young, aspiring girls.

“When you get a group of talented

athletes, who are all intrinsically

driven, resilient, and training, and

competing in each other’s backyard,

I think success is contagious. Of

course the AIS program in the early

years was probably a little ahead of

what the other countries were doing

collectively. But I think there was the

perfect recipe of talent and drive with

these women.”

Between 2004 and 2007, Annabel

attained podiums at 18 World Cups and

finished fifth in Melbourne, at the

Commonwealth Games. Despite her

outrageous success on the results sheet

there are gaps in form to be seen too - the

obvious consequences of injury and

illness. Bella has missed out on three

Olympic Games qualifications over 12

years, the effect of which would be

frustrating for any athlete and career-

ending for most. It did not, as common,

incite Bella’s switch to long course racing.

Nor did she ever consider quitting. She

remains definite of her motivations and

her own personal markers of success.

VICToRy: ironman 70.3 auckland, asia-pacific

Championship, 2013.

© Delly Carr

© Michael Dodge/Getty Images

© Delly Carr/ITU Media

© Delly Carr

eARLy dAys: Annabel (right) keeping company

on the podium with Champions emma

snowsill (left) and Loretta harrop (middle).

hALF dIsTAnCe: Annabel wins the Inaugural

scody Challenge Melbourne in 2014, in front of

Caroline Steffen, second (right) and Rebecca

hoschke, third (left).