What a year it has been!
I'll start from the beginning, generally the best blade to start!
Janurary
This month started off pretty tamely, with no big races too early in the year I could focus on putting in solid training! I did the Tauranga twilight meet again and had a decent run, considering the antics that went on the night before, any run is decent.
My first major race of the season came in the form of the NZ 10,000m champs. I ran a good race but wasn't quite as strong as I would have liked. I finished up 8th in 31:18:58, a huge PB. This pretty much rounded up January and gave me a solid platform to build the remainder of my season.
February
Coming off a solid 10,000m the next major race on the schedule was the Auckland 3000m champs. After skipping all the classic races this year I really hoped it had paid off and left me in great form to smash a fast 3k. Turns out this is exactly what happened as I had a huge breakthrough by ballsing up and deciding to just follow the early pace no matter what, not something I would normally advise! On this occasion though it turned out great as I hung on for 3rd behind Alex and Jono in a huge 12sec PB of 8:34:24. This pretty much completed my February with only a few small club races left.
March
The start of March signals the start of the most serious month for track. For me this started with the Auckland Championships. At this event i decided to run the 1500m where I had an awesome race. I was sitting in 4th position with 300m to go and kicked hard but still couldn't beat the true speed merchants and finished 4th in 4:00.35 my fastest 1500 of the season. Just over a week later came the Auckland 5000m championships. While I didn't achieve the podium finish that I had hoped or, I did achieve a different goal, one that I had been chasing for a few years, sub 15. I finally managed to break 15 min for the 5k with a 14:54.48 clocking. Just 2 weeks later came the New Zealand Track and Field Champs in Wellington. For the first time i planned to attempt a double up at Nationals with the 5000m and 1500m. Unfortunately my legs did not have it over the second half of the 5k after going through 2k on approximately 14:40 pace as I faded to 15:14.99. Also unfortunate was that my legs were not happy with me doubling up. I ran a decent race but made a tactical error and got stuck in the wrong group and missed the split in windy conditions and finished up just outside of qualifying for the final, not that I was too disappointed as I was stuffed!
 |
| New Zealand 5000m champs |
April
Following Nationals I took 5 days off to try and give my body a bit of a rest before jumping into XC. After this rest I was straight into heavy training with some of my biggest ever weeks mileage wise. I ran 3 weeks of 233, 241 and 208 kilometers. We also had a training camp in National park which included some truly brutal runs with insane elevation changes.
 |
| Elevation of one of our runs, 1816m of climbing! |
Time for some XC! Started off with a bit of a rust buster at the HEB XC where i finished up in 5th place in what was a good way to start the season. Following this I went down to Huntly where I raced the 10k. When I say race, I mean attempted to race. I had one of the most shocking 10ks of my life and struggled home in 4th place. I managed to get through though and decided to take it as a bad race and move on. Luckily I did because the week after I was 3rd at the Pakuranga XC. I ran a perfect race where I just grinded away until those following me dropped off.
June
Unfortunately Pakuranga would be my last good race for the XC season as it was pretty much all downhill from here. Right at the start of June I had the Christchurch half Marathon where I was hoping to crack a really good run. Unfortunately this did not eventuate and i struggled home in 1:10:15 about 2 min slower than what I wanted. part of the reason for this was I came down with an Awful sickness just after the finish and almost didnt make the prizegiving I was feeling so bad! After Christchurch came the Teams XC where I finished 6th in another bad race. I was also having Wisdom tooth issues over this month which may have explained why i raced so poorly!
July
The start of July always means North Island XC champs. Oh what a race, and not in a good way. Probably my worst race of the season and thats saying something. that being said, this was when my Wisdom teeth were at maximum pain levels. After this was a few good weeks of training before the Auckland XC champs. Another shocker as I finished 8th and missed out on the Auckland team for the first time in a few years. This race turned out to be a blessing as because I missed out on Nationals I set a new goal, the Auckland Marathon! This was both scary and exciting as I wanted to see what I could do.
August
Thankfully August bought about the start of my good racing. I began conditioning and started running the big mileage with a number of weeks in the 220km range. The week of Auckland Road Champs saw me run 200km before the race had even started! thankfully this didnt affect me at all as i had one of the races of my life. Jono and I ran to a very specific plan and it most certainly paid off as we went 1-2 in a decent field. We decided that our best chance was to attack from a long way out so we crushed the last 4km and got a lead which we held on to.
September
And that brings us to the current month! and what a month its been already! it all started with the NZ Road champs in Tauranga. I thought that the Auckland Champs was a good race, this was significantly better. I managed to run a very evenly split race on a good course in a strong field to finish 7th, my best nationals result to date! I was very happy with this race, Mainly because of how deep I was able to go, I took myself to the absolute limit for the first time and came away with an amazing result. managed to claim a few scalps as well which is always nice. Oh! and a road PB 31:34. Just one week later I ran my first marathon, the Lydiard Legend. I thought this was the perfect race for me as the start is only a few Km from my house and its over a course which I run parts of on a regular basis. It is also a race where people aren't expected to run particularly fast... so not as much pressure. The final reason I chose to do this one was it is considered the hardest road marathon and everything else should seem easy after this! And what a race I ended up having! I finished my debut marathon with the 3rd fastest time in history on the Legend course with 2:29;23! this time converts to around 2:23 on a flat course. Which is of course a great debut for anyone, let alone a 21 year old. The race still hasn't completely sunk in. I cant really believe that I just ran the 8th fastest time in the country on the hardest course. The thing I am most happy about is with how much ease I ran it with. I never feel like I went above about 80% effort so still have a lot more in me.
 |
| Leading the Group |
 |
| Never hurt so bad. |
 |
| Profile of the Legend, 816m of climbing! |
So that is the year so far!
From here the only goals which I have set in stone are the NZ Road Relays in Christchurch where ACA has an absolutely awesome team which we hope to have in the medals and of course the major goal the Auckland Marathon. The aim for the Auckland Marathon will have to be reassessed as i was only planning to run 2:26, this may need to be looked at after Saturday!
Hopefully it will all go well and I can continue to keep this hot racing streak alive!
Let me know what you think of my writing! this is my first blog so would love to know what you think so I can get better at it!
Cheers
No comments:
Post a Comment