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After attending today's press conference for the inaugural Cairns Airport Challenge Cairns, TMSM's editor Tim Bradley picked out a few quotes that summarised the feelings of the event's biggest stars about this new exciting race.

Cairns, Thursday June 2, 2011.

“She [Bek’s mum] can swim two-kilometres non-stop now, and I think she thinks it’s going to be just as easy as it is in the pool, but I haven’t told her about the crocodiles.”

-       Bek Keat on having her mum and sister racing in Cairns in the team’s half iron-distance event.

 

“To be racing next to him it’s going to be a bit of an honour. He’s a guy I’ve grown up idolizing in the sport, so to be racing alongside him is great… But to take him down will be even better.”

-       Tim Berkel on racing with two-time Ironman World Champion Chris McCormack.

 

“Kitzbuhel’s in two weeks time, so I’m super fast at the moment. It’s been a different prep for this event, but I think I’ve got 10 years of base mileage in and so I feel like speed will be a big asset coming into this race and it’s just about recovery then after that between now and Kitzbuhel.

“I’m under no illusions these kids are super fast and as I said before I’m more motivated by the fact I get to race the current crop of greats in Brownlee and Gomez. When I first started I was racing Brad Bevan, Greg Welch, Mark Allen and Dave Scott. So to have the opportunity to race the whole a spectrum of this sport since it began is a real honour. I think I can be competitive. I don’t think I can win one of these things. But I tell you what if I won one of these World Championship Series races I’d walk away, that’d be it, you’d hear about it for the rest of your lives: ‘you guys have got nothing, I’m done’.

“I’m looking forward to the challenge and as I said when I decided to take up this challenge I’d walked away from thinking I’d ever make an Olympic team after Sydney, but then the opportunity presented itself, so I’m in a win-win. If I make the team: fantastic. If I don’t: I’m no worse off and I’m quite content to walk away from the sport where I am; it’s a bonus. But I’ve got a lot of work to do, that’s for sure.”

-       Chris McCormack in response to a question on how he plans to be competitive in the ITU World Championship Series after Challenge Cairns.

 

“I’ve done a lot of racing already this season, some may say I’ve done too much but my old coach said this to me, and he meant this in the nicest way, ‘I am built like a German tank - I just never break down’. I love to race, I’m just lucky that I have been blessed with one of those bodies that I don’t get injured. I have backed up well after doing the two halves and I am ready to do it this Sunday."

-       Belinda Granger on her preference to race Iron-distance events, as opposed to the shorter, faster races.

 

“I’ll be at Noosa 100 per cent. The last time I raced Noosa I won and I said I’m never coming back [Chris laughs]. It took me eight years to win that race, so I thought I’d quit while I’m ahead.”

- Chris McCormack said it in response to a question about his plans to race more in Australia, and in particular Queensland for next three years.