End of Season Round-Up

Well it's been a long time since I last updated my blog, but I've had a very busy and successful few months so I'm going to let myself off with a warning not to neglect this for quite so long in future. Juggling 2 jobs, training and racing generally means that the act of writing about the training and racing gets neglected in favour of sleep and recovery!

When I posted 2 months ago I talked about wanting to stay fit and healthy in 2014 - so far that's going pretty well.

I've just finished my 2013/4 XC season, and without a doubt it's been my best cross-country season ever. Over the last 6 months I've done every race I'd planned to do, and I've NEVER managed this before. For a few consecutive years I've had tonsilitis or bronchitis, and invariably picked up ankle injuries from the rough terrain. This season I've avoided colds and coughs and whilst I did have a minor ankle sprain from stumbling on a tree root during a race, it only put me out of training for a few days and didn't interfere with my racing plans.

Main achievements:

• 3rd at County Champs
• 33rd at Midlands Champs
• 63rd at National Champs

At the start of the season I was trying to race myself back to fitness after missing months of training with a knee injury (cycling-related), and I decided I wanted to race well at those 3 races. Now I'm at the end of the season I'm very happy to have had good races when it mattered most to me. My coach, Phil Nichol, has done a fantastic job of building up my training whilst allowing me to race reasonably well throughout the season, before tapering down for the Midlands and the Nationals.
This year I've trained differently to any other year, combining shorter track reps with tempo sessions, long runs and slightly longer interval sessions. I've really enjoyed the Winter training and I think it's actually been the first year I've looked forward to every session - though with tempo sessions I think I've mostly been looking forward to the end of the session! It's a big change from previous years when I've felt like a lot of Winter training has been one log slog - perhaps the shorter training is part of the reason I've stayed illness and injury free, as my body hasn't taken quite such a battering!

So, Winter 2013/4 = SUCCESS!

However, this isn't a totally smug post. I had also been targeting a few Spring Duathlons with the aim of qualifying for the World Duathlon Champs, and due to a recurring knee injury brought on my cycling, I've struggled to get the training in. I've managed a bike ride of over 40 minutes only once in the last 10 months and that was followed by a week of knee pain. Of course I then tried to do this again a week later and the problem recurred, so I made possibly the MOST sensible decision of my sporting career and called a halt to cycle training and any hopes of representing GB at duathlon this year.
Last year I ignored a cycling injury till I could neither run, cycle, swim or walk. The year before I ignored a different cycling injury till I was in hospital.
This year I've learnt from my mistakes and I'm going to make the most of being able to run (and walk) and  focus on having a fab track season.

Right now I'm in the middle of my end of season break. While I am sad not to be racing at this weekend's duathlon, I am enjoying giving my body time to recover from 6 months of hard, tiring XC racing. All that mud and rain does get a bit much after a while, but I'm sure I'll be super excited to get stuck back in by the time October comes around. I know I'll definitely miss the XC atmosphere - for team spirit there's nothing else like it in running and I've loved lining up with my Telford AC team mates throughout the season. I've made some new friends in the Midlands and we've developed some healthy rivalries with the Wolverhampton and Tipton Ladies.

On reflection my main achievements aren't just the positions I've finished but the things I've gained as a person on the way to achieving those results and the experiences I've had.

Main Achievements:

• Racing an entire XC season without illness or injury
• Not missing a week's training for 6 months
• Getting my long run up to 13 miles (though this was a 1 off!)
• Discovering the training that works for me as an athlete
• Building friendships and rivalries with fellow runners
• Enjoying it all!

National XC 2014

A beautiful sunny day at Wollaton Park, Nottingham - my favourite XC venue.

A HUGE race with over 700 finishers, won by European XC medallist, Gemma Steel.
There can't be many races where club-standard competitors can line up against international medallists!

In a race that big, it can be hard to quantify what would be classified as a good race for you as an individual, and it can be even harder in a field that size to work out if you're in the process of achieving a decent result.

Before the race I'd said that I wanted to come in the top 100. Last year I was 102nd in a much smaller field at the Nationals in Sunderland, so top 100 seemed like a good target.

With so many in the field I made sure I got a good start but after a mile I realised I had very little idea if I was having a good race or not - unlike the Midlands where I know most of the athletes, I could see very few familiar faces and I could tell there were a fair few athletes in front of me!
I quickly realised the only way I could guarantee I was running a race I could be proud of, was to focus on running as hard as I could and not worry about anybody else.

It turned out to me a good tactic as I had my best ever XC race, finishing 63rd and giving it everything I had. Not a bad improvement from last year!

A New Year, A New Approach

The end of another year always makes me pause for reflection and look back on the events of the last 12 months. I know it’s an arbitrary point in the sand, and there’s no need to wait till the end of the year to review life and make any changes – but tradition dictates that the beginning of a new year is the time for resolutions and alterations so I feel inclined to pause for breath and consider the past year and how I’d like the next 12 months to go.

At the start of 2013 I had some exciting sporting aims, some of which I achieved and some I didn’t. And unfortunately some I never even got to have a go at achieving. With the World Triathlon Champs set for September 2013 in London over the iconic Olympic course in Hyde Park, I made this my main sporting aim for the year. My main aim was to qualify and I planned my season around this and entered various qualifying events over various distances. I never made it to the start line of a single qualification race, let alone the start line of the World Triathlon Championships themselves. After working single-mindedly towards a goal like this, it was a massive blow to miss so badly!

I try to think optimistically about all my races and sporting experiences – even if I have a bad race there’s usually something I can learn from it! I had a terrible race at the British Duathlon Champs this year, but I learnt that I am terrified of under-taking lorries downhill on busy A-roads and that it is very hard to run when my feet are completely numb. I bounced back from that to take bronze at the English National Duathlon Champs a few weeks later with a much better performance on a totally different course in totally different conditions. From there on I had a good couple of weeks, setting my first personal bests since 2007 – clocking 37.54 for 10km and 18.16 for 5km at the beginning of May. From there on, there’s not much of note to report. Illness and injury prevented me from racing and on the weekend of the World Triathlon Champs I was struggling round 5 miles with my knee still sore from injury but pleased to be completing my longest run for 4 months!

Sporting wise, which is what this blog is all about after all, it’s been a fairly disappointing last half of the year. What have I learnt from this though? Well I think I may have FINALLY learnt to listen to my body. I can still remember the exact moment at which I knew I was injured, and I wonder now if I’d backed off then instead of trying to push on for a couple more days, whether I would have recovered a lot quicker. For 2014 my main aim is not to get injured – if that means missing a few days training or replacing run sessions with swimming, then so be it. I’d rather run 300 days in a year and never set another pb, than miss months with injury each year! Hopefully listening to my body and being a lot more sensible with conditioning, core work and building flexibility and strength will actually allow me to run more AND set pbs – but we’ll have to see!

Aims for 2014? To be fit and healthy! I would like to run well and I would love to set some pbs, but this year my main aim is to avoid injury…oh and I’m going to switch things round from the last few years and not race any triathlons in 2014. I’m going to focus on the Spring Duathlon season before returning to my athletics roots and racing on the track this summer. From June onwards my longest race will be no more than twenty minutes, and if I do a few 800ms then I hope it will be a lot less than that! I can’t wait!

Happy running in 2014 everyone!

Liverpool XC: Euro Trials – Senior Women’s Preview

This Saturday’s Liverpool XC is my favourite race of the cross-country season. Not only is it fixture 2 of British Athletics Cross Challenge Series, it’s also the trials race for the Great Britain team for the European XC Champs. It’s my favourite race as a fan of the sport, because a number of the top athletes haven’t faced each other at cross-country since March – making the results hard to predict and the racing always exciting. Plus, this fixture is also part of the Liverpool & District League and the Mid-Lancs League, meaning it attracts hundreds of athletes in the Senior races from internationals to enthusiastic club runners. 

At the sharp end of the field, runners will be battling it out for 1 of 6 places on the British team for the European XC Championships in Belgrade, Serbia on 8^th December. With only the top 3 guaranteed selection and the U23s racing alongside the seniors, competition will be fierce with only Gemma Steel a dead-cert for a place on the start line in Belgrade. With Julia Bleasdale returning from injury since her 8^th places over 5km and 10km at the 2012 Olympics, now out of Liverpool with a cold, she could take one of the 3 discretionary spots after showing good form with a 56 second victory over Tish Jones at the Surrey League and a 23^rd place at the Cross de Atapuerca in Spain.

This Autumn’s road racing circuit has seen dominant performances from Gemma Steel at the Birmingham Half Marathon and National Road Relay Champs, with a whole host of others running well across the Run Britain and Great Run series. Louise Damen and Tish Jones both set PBs at last weekends’ Leeds Abbey Dash, whilst Charlotte Purdue made a spectacular return to racing at a very windy Great South Run. Purdue will hope to have progressed from there and come to Liverpool in the form to challenge Steel, but Damen is focusing on the roads this Winter and won’t be competing. Purdue’s Aldershot team mates will be competitive as well – Steph Twell’s pedigree over road, track and cross country means you can never discount her whilst Lily Partridge, this year’s Southern XC Champion clocked the fastest leg at the National XC Relays a couple of weeks ago, as well as making an encouraging half marathon debut at Birmingham where she finished 4^th in 74:55. Partridge should be set to compete in her 5^th successive European XC Champs, most likely in the U23 team but could challenge for a top 6 place overall. 

Few athletes have faced each other over 8km of mud and grass yet this season, so it will be interesting to see whether Gemma Steel’s dominance on the road is challenged on the country by the top performers so far this Winter. At the opening fixture of the British Athletics Cross Challenge at Bristol, a small but high quality field fought it out in the first major XC race of the season, with Katie Brough finishing 4 seconds clear of Juliet Potter. With Lauren Deadman, Stevie Stockton, Jane Potter and Emma Clayton completing the top 6 here, they should all be in the mix for a top 6 spot at Liverpool. Others we can expect to see near the front of the race on Saturday include U23 Beth Potter and Trafford AC’s Jacqueline Fairchild who ran Bristol winner Katie Brough close in the opening fixture of the Manchester League and backed this up with the 4^th fastest leg at the National XC Relays. Lauren Howarth is another to show great form on the roads this Autumn, in addition to her 6th place finish over 3km at the European Indoor Champs back in March. Elle Baker, Emily Wicks and Rosie Smith were all GB representatives last winter and can’t be discounted this year either should they race. Last year’s breakthrough act, Caryl Jones, may be coming back in to form but she’s yet to show she can follow up on her 15^th place at last year’s European XC. Aly Dixon, not known as a cross country runner, is returning from the injury that put paid to her Autumn Marathon plans and could be another to watch.

Saturday should see a highly competitive race with good indications for team success in Serbia in a fortnight’s time. Will Purdue or any others challenge Steel over 8km of undulating grass and mud? We look forward to finding out!

Expanding the Blog

For a few weeks now I’ve been considering expanding the subject matter of my blog. Over the last couple of years I’ve been writing quite regularly and often quite less regularly about myself. I’m not sure I’m interesting enough to justify producing such a large amount of words on! Some weeks I just do my training almost exactly the same as the week before. Some weeks I do exciting races in other countries, or do training sessions so ridiculously epic that they deserve their own entry in cyber-space (but the former hasn’t happened this year and the latter happens very rarely and only because of Don Nichol at Altrincham AC in the depths of Winter!). But most of the time I’m just being me, running, cycling and swimming around. And there’s only so much that can be said about that!

So instead of continuing to write endlessly about what I’ve been doing, I’m going to treat my avid readers to blogs on what I’ve been thinking about. I regularly subject my boyfriend to lengthy one-sided discussions (rants) about sports related issues that are consuming my thoughts, and whilst I’m sure he does love listening to them, he has suggested that they could add a new dimension to my blog. Perhaps he thinks my views on sport are so well-informed and interesting they really need to be shared with the wider world, or perhaps he’s just had enough of hearing about my outrage at the lottery funding or non-funding of athletes he’s never heard of. Regardless, I’m going to expand my blog to cover my thoughts on sports as well as my own adventures in sports.

Please do leave comments if you disagree/agree with what I’m saying and feel free to share my blogs with other passionate sports fans!

Watch this space...

Coming back from Injury

If you’ve not read every single moan I’ve written in this blog, then you’ve missed a lot of complaining about all the races I’ve missed: big races, World Championships, small races, team races, track races, road races, duathlons, triathlons – everything from 400m on the track to Olympic distance triathlon. I wouldn’t recommend you read my old blog posts, unless you’re feeling so entirely out-of-this-world positive that you need a bit of negativity to bring you back to reality. Being injured is a pain – actually a pain; walking, driving, sleeping, sitting etc were all a pain, never mind trying to run, bike or swim. And on top of that it’s a bit of a mental battle as you see every sporting thing you’d planned going ahead without you – races still go on, everyone else keeps on training, sporting social circles continue to exist without you. You’re confined to the side lines of what had been a core part of your life, and it’s hard to stay positive during these times. No matter what other activities you fill your time with or how you make the most of the extra time and seize the opportunity to focus on other interests, there’s no denying that when you can’t do something you love and are passionate about, things get a little tough.

I absolutely love my sport(s) and everything they bring to my life. I love running. Every time I see somebody else running, even if I’ve already run that day, I will wish I was running. Every time I see water, I wish I was swimming in it – and I’ve been that way as long as I can remember. And every time I see a cyclist speeding along beautiful country roads, I usually wish I could cycle as well as them and then I wish I was cycling! As I’ve said before, the social side of sport is fantastic – the camaraderie from being part of a team, the friends you make training and competing and the like-minded people you meet everywhere you run, bike or swim! Seeing friends work hard in training and improve is always inspiring, and I love how happy people are when they’ve had a good race. It’s a great world to be part of and although I do love getting good results of my own, I knew I’d be happier as soon as I was back in my sporting world instead of letting it all pass me by, following my friends triumphs and tribulations from the side lines.

So after missing a lot of races, less than 2 months ago I decided I’d had quite enough of not racing. Even if I was going to be racing quite slowly, I wanted to be part of it all again. Since then I’ve done a few road races and some short cross-country races – 5km is my limit till I manage to get some more training in. I was hoping I’d be able to race myself back to a reasonable level of fitness. For me, no training every matches the intensity of racing. I would say I can push myself quite hard in training, hit times on reps that I need to – but I often have another gear in racing that I can never find in training. Must be my competitiveness!

It’s taken 6 weeks, but I now feel like I’m able to race hard over 5km, which is a huge improvement on where I was at the end of September, running XC races in trainers and having to take a few days off a week. I’ve had my first top 10 XC finish of the season, finishing 7^th at the North Staffs league in Stafford, plus a week later I clocked a decent 5km time of 18:58 in the Telford ParkRun. I’ve had a great time racing again, training back on the track with my team mates and enjoying some lovely runs round the countryside. I’m definitely a lot more positive about everything than I was 2 months ago, but whilst I’m on my way back, I’m certainly not there yet and this weekend reminded me how far I still have to go.

This weekend was the Grafham Water Duathlon that I had optimistically entered a few weeks back when British Triathlon suddenly announced a raft of late season races which would be qualifiers for next years’ European Duathlon Champs. After missing pretty much every single big race I wanted to do this year, I was really annoyed that the qualifiers had been moved 5 months ahead of their normal schedule, giving me very little chance of getting fit enough to qualify. Regardless of this, I entered the race and hoped that I would be able to take part. Last weekend I was out on my bike, and after 30 minutes cycling I had a bit of an epiphany…no matter how much I wanted to race, it was very unlikely my body would actually hold up! It didn’t matter how much I “wanted it”, there was to be no battle of mind over matter, I simply had not been able to do the training to even make it round the course. And if I tried there was a definite risk of making my injury worse. So I didn’t race this weekend, which of course means I didn’t qualify for the European Duathlon Champs in 5 months’ time. Luckily though, the World Duathlon Champs are a mere 6 months away, and the races to qualify for the British team are a good 4 months away still, giving me plenty of time to get back to full fitness. Needless to say I am a little annoyed that these late season qualification races were announced with only a few weeks’ notice. My annoyance comes from not having time to regain fitness after injury, but I know a number of my fellow duathletes are a little annoyed at having last minute additions to their already long seasons, which for many started with the British Champs back in March. I believe the normal Spring qualification races were moved to the preceding Autumn as a result of the poor weather conditions we experienced this Spring which prevented some of the qualification races from going ahead as planned – so I can understand the logic here, I just would have liked it to have fitted in with my return from injury a little better!

So, what’s next? Well I’ll be aiming for a few Spring Duathlons now and the World Duathlon Champs in Spain. Over the Winter I’ve got a good few XC races to go at with the Midlands and National XC Champs being my target races. I’m also hoping to get in a couple of 10km races as I build up my training, so I’ve got plenty to keep me motivated to get back to full fitness. And if my love of running wasn’t enough, I’ve got lots of club races with the hope of team prizes and cakes to look forward to as well!

Lovin' the team!

TEAM TELFORD!

"Team" has been a major motivation for me over the last couple of weeks as my training and racing has all been geared towards team competition.
Although running is an individual sport and can never be considered a team sport in the way that football and hockey can, the Winter season is full of team competitions that mean I want to run the best I can, not just for myself but for my team mates as well.
In fact, looking at my race calendar for the next few months I've only got 2 races scheduled this side of Christmas where I'll be running solely for myself as an individual, though those are both races where I have high individual goals so the pressure will still be on!

I'm very lucky to have been part of a fantastic women's team for the last few years - in fact I've been a member of Telford AC since I started training, but I feel really lucky to have such a great group of ladies to train and compete with over the last few year. Together we've had successes some of us would never have had as individuals - we've won league cross country competitions, medals at the Midlands Cross Country Championships, Midlands Road Relay Championships and even a silver medal at the National XC Championships a few years ago.
When I started back running a couple of years ago after a long period of injury, it was the Telford AC ladies who encouraged me on what were initially very short runs, and then longer runs till eventually I was back racing. I can say with all certainty that if it wasn't for this fabulous group that I wouldn't have made it back to the level I'm at now. Thank you girls!

This Winter we've got a few league competitions, North Wales and North Staffs XC where I know if everybody runs well we've got a chance of winning the league - and that's a fantastic thing to be part of. Personally I'm aiming for a few top 10 places and after missing a whole summer with injury I'm delighted to have already scored a 12th and an 11th place finish in each of the respective leagues. What's even more fantastic is that as a team we've finished 1st in each of these races, giving us a great start to the season. It's pretty exciting to be aiming for some silverware as a team and makes the races that bit more important and interesting.

Last year we took a surprise 3rd at the Midlands Cross Country Champs and I can still remember how hard I worked over the last 1/2 mile to overtake runners who I knew were likely to be scoring runners from rival clubs. I felt far more motivated to work hard up the last hill knowing that finishing 50th instead of 51st could be the difference between a bronze medal and nothing. In the end we took bronze by a single point - and we all went home from that race far happier than if we'd raced as individuals and just had our individual results to celebrate.
Every time we get together and run well as a team, it's so much better than just pottering round on my own! If I have a bad run, there's a whole group of friends there to pick me up, encourage me on and tell me next time will be better - and that counts for everyone! And regardless of how well anybody runs, we always have a fantastic day out.

Here we are on a lovely day out in Bangor:

So why have I suddenly been struck by the importance of the team?
2 reasons - firstly, racing triathlon and duathlon over most of the year I've missed out on the team atmosphere, and being back within that for the cross country season has really emphasized the difference having a good team makes.
Secondly, this weekend we competed in the National Road Relay Championships - the first National Champs of the Winter season and a great event. It really is one of the best social occassions of the Winter calendar, providing an opportunity to meet up with running friends from all over the country without the unfriendly snow of February's National XC Champs. The National Road Relays is all about TEAM (it's pretty hard to finish a relay without any team mates!) and this weekend brought together the best teams from all over the country. Aldershot, Farnham & District took the womens title for the umpteenth consecutive year and broke the course record, showing what a team of superstars they are. With every single athlete on their team having represented Great Britain or England they were always going to be unbeatable. I don't think any other team had a recent World or European Junior Champion, but AFD had 2!

Now we're not a team of superstars, but we do have our super runner, Claire Martin as team captain and leg 1 runner. Claire's been consistently among the top 20 in the country for the last 20 years and she doesn't seem to be slowing down at all! Despite being by far and away the fastest runner on the team, she seems just as delighted as the rest of us when we get a good result as a team. However there is a downside to having one runner who's super speedy...whoever runs the leg after her on the relays knows they're likely to be overtaken by a few teams! Claire brought us back in 9th with a great run, 18 seconds faster than she clocked at the Midlands version of this event 3 weeks ago. Nellie took over on 2nd and also took 18 seconds off her Midlands time to handover to Michelle in 31st place before I ran the last leg, running a few seconds faster than 3 week ago. Last time I ran the 2nd leg and had a lot of athletes around me and really enjoyed moving through the field overtaking 18 teams on my way. This time I was quite isolated on last leg and didn't enjoy it quite so much, though the rain may have had something to do with that as well! I'm definitely more of a racer than a time trial-er and I'm looking forward to some actual "races" over the next few weeks now.

Together we finished 32nd in the Nationals and everyone was really pleased with their runs. We were also 7th of the Midlands teams - not a bad performance at all and a great day out...made even better by the Costa Coffee that's just opened at Sutton Park. A post race Chocolate Orange Mocha kept me awake for the rest of the day and our Telford AC girls night out.
Here's the full team about to enjoy a nice meal together - our first team outing for quite a while! Thanks girls for making running so much fun. Together we achieve so much - here's to a good Winter :)

P.S. Oh and thanks to Nellie for the lovely run through the field of cows - not every day we narrowly escape cows by climbing over barbed wire fences and through a compost heap! Crumpets and homemade jam totally made up for the trauma!