(dramatic introductory music)
- Hello my name is Fraser Cartmell and I
am the newest member of the team at the
Global Triathlon Network.
(upbeat music)
- Global Triathlon Network, Flava Frase, L.L. Cool Frase,
the Scottish man with the smoothest tan
are you crazy I can't believe he's gonna
be on everyone's screen it's just magic, it's magic.
- I recently finished my last race as an athlete
which happened to be in Mexico, an Iron Man 70.3 event
and that brought to close a long spell of racing for me
which actually began back in 2001 as a junior.
Which if I'm honest makes me feel pretty old.
- My pathway into sport was ITU short course racing and
I guess I got into a fairly decent level throughout
my University years, raced for Great Britain as a
junior at Under 23 at the likes European and
World Under 23 Championships.
Did the odd few World Cups for Britain
as a senior too but I as under no illusion of
how good I could really be and
I was happy with the level that I'd manage to get to.
And I guess that's where middle and long course
racing was able to fill the void for me luckily.
I did my first Iron Man 70.3 event at the
now defunct U.K. Wimbleball 70.3 in 2007.
And managed to win it.
Which was pretty good way to start I guess.
And I guess a decade on if somebody had told me
I'd win an Iron Man multiple 70.3's,
go to World's 70.3 Champs and get a top ten and
go to Iron Man Hawaii twice as a pro
I don't think I'd have believed them.
So am I content with what I did in the sport?
Absolutely.
Would I like to a been better and win more?
Yeah, everybody does.
But I'm happy with where I'm leaving the sport.
(upbeat music)
Right so the winds starting to pick up here
and it's starting to get a little bit chilly so
I think it's time to find somewhere a little bit warmer.
(relaxing music)
Ah yes.
Good yeah, can I have a pint please.
- Yep, I thought you said you guys were working?
- Yeah, I'm retired now though.
- Oh, that's good.
- I really believe that my Scottishness has had a
really large impact on the course my career has taken.
The choices of races I've made, where I've gone to
train and really shaped, in my opinion,
the career I ended up having.
What do I think that Scottishness means?
Well I suppose it's been an ability to deal with
unpredictable conditions, unfavourable weather,
conditions and facilities that
elsewhere in the world have seemed
favourable, good, much easier have undoubtedly
meant it seems like a walk in the park compared to
what I grew up with and was generally
used to at home Scotland.
And good examples of this for me have been
races where you've got rough road surfaces,
hilly technical terrain,
where the weather has been really pretty bad,
cold water, wind , driving rain, all theses things that
a lot of my competitors would get really phased by
and I suppose by default it was just kinda normal
for me and didn't mind it.
Don't get me wrong
I never really enjoyed racing in those
types of conditions but it definitely didn't
affect me nearly as much as those who I was racing against.
And I definitely picked up on that and
tried to use it to my advantage.
So my childhood spent swimming and competitively
going to competitions and then
I guess a good stab at doing an ITU career draught legal
racing definitely set me up well with a
proper swim background to come in to long course racing
and that was quickly a strength I
tried to capitalise on really
and in my early years it definitely was and
it really be in a fortunate position where
I was often really the pointy end of racing and
that was something that I thrived upon to be honest.
And I really enjoyed that aggressive racing dynamic
of being in the front, tried to push on
and stay at the front obviously because
that was a fun thing to be doing and
it was just something that I became known as I suppose.
Somebody who is a good swimmer and then
that coupled with also spending that time as a
kid playing around on mountain bikes and
being active on a bike.
I was really comfortable riding and
I think when I moved over to do long course racing
and spending you know quite a bit of time
on the bike as we have to do as we have to train for it.
I just quickly grew to be a decent rider and
that coupled with the swim gave me, you know,
it was a pretty potent swim bike combination and
it allowed me to be really active at the front of races
and for the most part throughout my career,
you know I did not bad if I got to a race
able to execute on those good strengths.
Retirement from triathlon is a word and
phrase I was hesitant to use.
Retirement for me is quite a grand word and
implies as being a really strong career behind it
and I say that meaning,
I'm not, not proud of what I have achieved in the sport
don't get me wrong, I certainly am.
I never for a minute when I was a kid
expected to be able to travel the world,
race for my Country, win something like an
Iron Man for goodness sakes.
Someplace like Hawaii to me was just you know
might as well been the moon.
So I'm extremely proud of what I've
achieved but I never really thought of it
as something that I would have called a career as such
but that being said I'm retired and it's finished
and I don't regret it.
I'm definitely in a point in life where
I needed to think about what I was gonna
go out and do in life.
I studied engineering out of University
usual sort of time skills in life
in my early twenties.
I have that degree but never used it so
I had certainly started thinking over the last
year or two of racing about whether I could use that
and what life might entail after racing.
And I've seen it with a lot of other athletes
who they just drift on and on in the sport
because they don't have anything else to do.
And I was worried and conscious about that
being a trap that I was going to fall into as well.
So being able to come into something like GTN
still linked with the industry, still have contact
with an awful lot of very close friends and
people I've spent a lot of time with over the years.
That's like a win, win for me.
So, I'm just really, really looking forward to
getting stuck in, seeing what I can bring to GTN
and being involved in triathlon.
(upbeat music)
So what am I gonna bring to GTN?
As I've allude to I've had a pretty long career and
I've been extremely fortunate to train and race
all around the world to be fair and
that's exposed me to an awful lot of different athletes
that I've trained with, raced against but
it's also allowed me to train under and with
and awful of really knowledgeable coaches too
and I think all the information I've learned
from those athlete, coaches.
Some good, bad as well.
Tips, hints, tricks and things that
I've picked up over the years.
I think, well I certainly hope I can bring a lot of
that to the channel and share that with the
viewers as well which I am excited to do.
And on that note is a swimming background that
I have that I chatted about before.
I'm really interested in all things to do with the water.
I think I've got a really good handle on form,
open water technique.
I'm happy to discuss that with anybody,
by no means am I a coach but it's
definitely something I'd feel happy and
confident to chat about and really look forward to
exploring a bit more detail swim form and
technique over time with he channel.
That also goes with the bike.
I grew up riding a bike, really loved
training and being on my bike if the
weather is okay mind you.
I'm also really excited about all things
tech, new bits of equipment.
I use to love gettin my bike ready for race stage,
just making sure it was in, you know really,
good condition and something that I'd
be proud to have hanging there in the
rack in transition so I hope over time
I can spend more time looking into
bits and pieces that are coming to the triathlon
market and things we can talk about in the tech
side of things on the channel and
I'll definitely forward to getting my teeth
stuck into that.
Well, that's been my story so far
up into joining the team here at GTN.
I'm really looking forward to helping bring
a lot more content for you viewers to see.
I hope you've enjoyed listening to my story so far,
if you have then please give the video a thumbs up
and remember to click on the globe
if you wanna see all the videos from the GTN channel.
And if you wanna see the first video I filmed,
which is how to run a sub 40 minute 10K,
then please click here.