Having MTS calling me an ‘ex-blogger’ has made me feel guilty that I haven’t been around for a while now so here I am back on to keep you up to date with things as best I can.
I’ve struggled with finding time to fit everything in. I’m working more and more hours at my ‘day job’ which is now getting really busy with all sorts of different activities going on all over the places. Add that to training over 100miles a week plus 4 strength and conditioning/core sessions and I’m sure you’ll appreciate that time is precious!! The remaining time I do have left is usually spent eating or sleeping!! In fact I don’t even do much of that these days!! I was one who used to never get out of bed before 8am now I’m up and out at 5.30 every morning!!!
Anyway I had intended picking the blogs up again over the next few weeks as I’m off to Ethiopia to train for 4 weeks next Tuesday! I don’t know if I’m more excited or scared at the thought of going over there to live and train with their athletes – many of which are truly world class and have won medals at the Olympics and world championships!! That bit I am nervous about, but the whole experience I am really excited about!! It will be live changing to see how these guys live and train! So when I got the offer I grabbed it with both hands. It has meant a little bit of rearranging on my training, racing and work plans but that’s ok. And I wouldn’t be going at all if it wasn’t for my employers here at Team Northumbria (Northumbria University) allowing me so much time off work – thanks guys!!
Anyway before I go away a quick recap on what has happen in my ‘running world’ since the start of 2009. First up was the Durham cathedral relays where Chester gained revenge on Morpeth for their defeat last year. We won quite convincingly and I recorded the fastest time of the day by about 40 seconds so that was pleasing. Next up was a very muddy Northern XC champs. I hate XC enough without it being a total quagmire!! But I ran solidly to finish 6th which equals my highest ever placing at the championships and we were 3rd in the team race so came home happy.
After the Northerns I started to hit big miles (100+ per week) in training in the build up to some big races in March. My next race was cancelled due to the snow and ice. Os it was straight on to the long journey down to Bourton On The Water for a road 10k! To travel the length of the country for a village 10k shows that it has a good reputation for being fast and it stood up to that strongly. I had a fantastic race recording a lovely new PB of 32m32s!!! Woohoo!! When I saw my time I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry!! I knew I was in good shape from the training I had put in but to run that fast was just gobsmacking!! Although my coach insists that he knew it was on the cards!! To put it into perspective – on the day it ranked me 2nd in the UK (females) and 15th in the WORLD!! I’ve now moved down to 20th in the world but I’m less than 10seconds behind Shalane Flaneghan who won the bronze medal at the Olympic 10,000m in the summer so I’ll happily settle for that!!
After this performance, people started to get a bit carried away and began thinking I could make the GB for the world cross country champs at the end of this month. I wasn’t too convinced as I know I am a far better road runner than country runner and knew that once I hit the green and brown stuff it would be a completely different story – plus my legs were still wrecked from the 10k!! Anyway I proved everyone wrong and had a bit of a disappointing run at the inter counties (world cross trials) I finished 30th which I thought I could have easily made the top 10-15 but like I say my legs are still feeling the effects of the 10k and it just wasn’t there on the day – I did help the north east win the bronze medals in the team race though – Woohoo!! Although we did throw away the gold but I won’t go into that!!
So that me up to date – I’m counting down the sleep until I fly off to the birth place of running next Tuesday. I plan to keep a blog updated but I am not too sure how readily available inter access will be. For my first week there I am staying with a former GB marathon runner, Richard Neurekar, so hopefully I will be able to get online then and then after that I would imagine that if go to one of the big hotels (Sheraton, Hilton) they would have access. Anyway I will do my best to keep everyone up to date on my going on’s!!
Take care
aly
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