What can I say, the weekend finally came where I was off to Slovakia to race in the European Aquathlon Championships. After leaving school in the afternoon of Thursday, we arrived in Bratislava late into the evening, so we pretty much found ourselves going straight into bed and left the exploring to the Friday. On Friday we had a chance to explore the city and to our delight, the weather was very sunny with a slight breeze. About 10,000 steps later we had seen lots of the city, the old and the new parts and were pleasantly surprised by it all. Although at midday, we jumped into a taxi and travelled 15 mins out of the centre, to a lake where the aquathlon was taking place. My swim familiarisation was at 4 and when I arrived with all of my kit at the lake for the first time, I was amazed by the water. It was nothing like any other triathlon I had done, where you couldn't see more than 10cm infront of you, but the water looked as clear as anything. The swim familiarisation went well and I just did one lap of the 500m, which was good to get to know the course, and I also learnt that I needed to make sure I didn't go too wide on the return from the second inflatable buoy. My Zone3 wetsuit and Zealous 2 piece swimsuit were great to test out too. Once the swim familiarisation was complete and the pre race briefing, we headed back to the hotel to get an early supper. After struggling to find somewhere to buy pasta, I finally found some, although I would have definitely have preferred my home made pasta by this point. After an early night, I found myself waking up at 7am, in order to get to the lake on time. The lake was pretty much next to the hotel, but I had to go with the strict timings of transition set up. It wasn't long before the time quickly went by and my race was starting shortly. I had a good running warm up and then jumped into the lake for a suitable swimming warm up too. The water was cold, but you quickly warmed up and luckily my wetsuit fits me really well, which helps to reduce any unnecessary cold water getting in. Once we were all brought into the holding pen, we were released and made our way to the start line. This was the first time I had done a run into the water start and I wasn't too amused because it was so so stony on the ground just at the edge of the water, so it was painful to run on. When the gun went, you didn't have much of a choice, either waddle into the water, don't hurt your feet and be slow, or just suck the pain up and run quickly in, and with the adrenaline going, that is what I found myself doing. I'll be honest, after coming out of the swim having been dunked, dragged and kicked, I staggered into transition over a minute behind the second last U20 athlete and I struggled to stay on two feet, as my head started to spin. I gave myself ten seconds in transition just to feel normal than I just ran off, with all the determination to do some catching up. Luckily the run did go much more in my favour, and I managed to finish in 5th catching several other U20s. The 5km run was done in 5x 1km laps, which made it easy to see how I was closing the gaps on people. When I crossed the line, I was relieved and very tired. The sun had been very strong and the temperature was over 25 degrees, which I am definitely not complaining about, but it did make it that little bit more tricky.
We then headed back to central Bratislava and spent the rest of the day sight seeing again and also picking up a bit of a tan (... maybe burn in some places), as it was super hot and sunny. I have really enjoyed my trip to Slovakia, and it has been an amazing experience. I am heading off home soon, and will return back to training, to prepare for a track race next weekend. Now I think I will be sticking with predominantly running in the future, as I hope to advance in that and come into the next cross country and track season strong. Love G x
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Lets scroll back to last weekend when I did the 1500m at the Kent Champs, although a lot has happened between then and now... a geography, chemistry and maths exam, but I am finally happy to say that, I'm DONE... (and got instagram, twitter and snapchat back). Back to last weekend. On the Friday is was my birthday, although the latin and economics exam, took most of the enjoyment out of the day. On Saturday, my English exam followed, but once I finished english, I got to go home early and relax for the rest of day... well I say relax it was mainly revision. After my usual pre race routine (pasta, banana, etc.) On Saturday morning my alarm goes off, and with tired eyes I turn it off... 30 mins later I wake up and realise, I had fallen back asleep, and was now running considerably late...oops, I think the stress of exams had got to me a bit. Finally I made it into the car, and after mum and I battled with her new cars satnav, we finally got it to take us a quick way to Ashford, however it took us along some ridiculously narrow lanes... we were not a fan! After actually getting in a good warm up, even though in my head we were running late, but I like to leave about an hour lee way, because I get a little bit anxious about being later, so I still had factored in time for problems. Soon enough I found myself on the start line and I was second from the end, and to me is was quite apparent we were in pb order... so I thought I would be right at the back of the field. And BANG... we were off and straight away the pack was running away from me, and I was like, um... arg this isn't the plan. I stayed patient and the laps went by and I was catching others up and with one lap to go, I was in fourth, further up the field than I had expected. I had the girl in third in my sights, there was a significant gap between us with one lap to go, but I wanted to give it my best shot, to catch up as much as possible, and I crossed the line 2 seconds behind 3rd, and I think the photos show that I gave it everything. After the race, I crossed the line with a 5 second pb, so I was really pleased with that! However I am now definitely hungry for a sub 5 1500m now, after getting 5:01. After saying well done to everyone, which is always nice, because through the xc season I got to know all the girls, even from the other clubs, so a team photo only seemed appropriate. This weekend, I have been enjoying life far too much, with having no revision, which is just great! I was in London yesterday and walking around all day is surprisingly exhausting and yesterday evening I definitely crashed on the sofa, and I just loved to have some time to watch tv, which I felt like I haven't done in ages. Next week is very exciting for me, I'm off to Slovakia for the European Aquathlon Championships, so next weeks blog post will be an exciting one, and keep track of my instagram too!
Love G x Hey, I’m Ruth! I have written a few posts for several blogs now and I’m big social media fan but for those who haven’t stumbled across me before, I’m an 18-year-old dental student in my first year at Leeds university. Oh, I LOVE to run too! I was really excited when Grace asked if I would write a guest post and even more so when she suggested If I would discuss my life juggling running and a dental degree- my two greatest passions! So far my time being a student athlete has brought about so many fantastic opportunities from representing the university in some amazing races to already being let loose on a real dental clinic! Ofcourse, uni as an athlete hasn’t been without its tough times either. I can work or train far too hard and feel incredibly tired without my parents or coaches right at the side line to help me through. At uni I often feel like I’m forced to make the choice between fully committing myself to running or being ‘half in, half out’ (training hard and partying hard). Full commitment means missing out on a typical uni social life but knowing you couldn’t have worked any harder towards running. The ‘half in, half out’ choice entails experiencing a rigorous running regime alongside a student life but neither of them to the fullest. With aims in marathon/ ultra-running at a much older age I opted for the later. Despite choosing the half in half out option, with parties for students most nights you tend to feel like the odd one out. You have to discipline yourself to go to bed before your race the next morning and at that point it’s so easy to only see the good in other people’s lives. You can start doubting your intention to train and question ‘what am I doing?!’ To me, that’s just about where the self-doubt stops. Everytime I wake up in the morning and train, I realise why I do just what I do. I get a sense of accomplishment every time I tick off a challenging session, whether I felt good or not, I woke up and I did it. Through my sports at uni, I feel like I have made some of the best friendships. It’s a strange sort of bond where you share your blood, sweat and tears every session. Your training friends are there when you are struggling to pick you up and tell you to keep going. There’s an indescribable level of desire everytime you toe up the start line to push your body to its absolute limits, to be quicker than last time, to beat your records and then to beat someone else’s records. Whether you run well or not, there’s something inside of you telling you to keep pushing and to get faster. It a hunger for more that you can’t describe or understand unless you’re a competitive sportsperson. Going to university and bringing my running commitment with me has been a huge process of learning my own personal balance between study, sports and social life. It’s about establishing individual limits (not someone else’s), how many hours of study, training and how much time can you spend with friends and then still find time to get enough sleep as well! All this with being happy in what you do and without (too much) stress! And when you can’t quite fit everything in, what do you prioritise and what do you choose to compensate? Being a student athlete is tough, but trust me, the benefits far outweigh the negatives. My passion and commitment towards my athletics is what, I believe has got me to where I am today. Its conveyed through to my academics and my athletic achievements have given me the confidence to aim high at uni. With the support of my friends, family and coaches so far, life as a student athlete has been extremely rewarding. As I approach the end of my first year at uni as an athlete here are some lessons to take away from my experience so far: -My family, friends and coaches are more important than anything else in the world. -Sleep = success. Get it and try to get lots of it when you can. -Halls are LOUD. When people say, they are loud, they’re not joking. -Bikes will get stolen, so A. Choose an old rusty bike and B. Purchase a D-lock. -Wilkinson’s is the most important shop on the high street. Don’t forget that. -Carrying your weekly food shop home is like combing the toughest strength and conditioning session with extreme weight lifting. -Running means a lot…but not everything. You don’t have to sacrifice your exams on Wednesday morning so you can fit in your Tuesday evening track session. It’s okay to say no sometimes. -Whatever the weather, bring a waterproof wherever you go. -Fruit is expensive! Except the 9 pack of satsumas from Morrison’s. - Self-love and confidence go a long way. -Taking time out and doing absolutely nothing now and again is important physically and mentally. -Don’t be afraid to try new things. -18 year olds are definitely not adults yet. -You will create some interesting new recipes- fajitas with bagels because you have no tortillas? -You can’t afford the new Nike pro’s. Don’t even bother to look. -Believe you can achieve and its crazy what you will accomplish. -Sell by dates are all lies -Whether you have a good race or bad race, the world will go on. -Runners = All the fridge and freezer space. Apologise nicely. -Procrastination = More stress later. -Every messy situation you get into, it will get sorted in the end. -Wherever you go, you will meet some amazing people. -Being a student athlete is 100% possible no matter the uni course, the level of competition, it can be done. All the best,
Ruth x On Sunday at 6:30 my alarm rings... its fair to say this isn't my favourite thing for a Sunday morning, but this was because I was heading off to a UKYDL race, with my club, and the coach was leaving my pick up at 7:30, unfortunately my pick up was the first one of four, so there was a lot of stop and starting for the first hour, but soon we were off. It wasn't long until we arrived... okay thats a lie, it was about an hour and a half, and I tried my best to get some of my work done on the coach, but that proved rather difficult. When we arrived we set up our base on the top of the bank and I got my blanket out and got comfy. It was 10:30 and my race wasn't until 2:45. I had my lunch rather early, because I wanted to make sure it was completely digested before I raced, so that occupied me for a bit and then the rest of the time I watched people race. The wind had started to pick up and when I was looking at the track, I could see it had been built into a dip, I thought I didn't need to worry about the wind. As the wind wouldn't be able to get you in the little dip... oh but how wrong could I have been. The time finally came for me to go off on my warm up, which I was actually quite excited about, after watching lots of people race. My warm up felt a bit like hard work to be honest, and my legs were struggling to get round the football fields a few times, at a very easy pace. I got to the start line, to only see another 6 other people, and I quickly realised I was in fact the only u20, and the rest were u17, so all I had to do was get around and I would win... simple. However I wasn't just out there to win, but I wanted to get a good solid 3000m time down for this season and see what I had in me. After 7.5 laps, of pushing through wind and running alone I came to the finish, and it certainly didn't feel like an easy race, my legs felt like bricks and I was battling through the wind most of the time, and not to mention running on my own, but to cross the line with a huge pb made me pretty excited, for hopefully more to come! Although I had a very full on day, and was out the house for 12 hours, it was good to get the 3000m under my belt, and made me even more excited for the rest of my track season, and to hopefully break some more of my goals.
Sorry this post is a bit late, but I have had an important english presentation I needed to get done, and now it is all done, so I can relax for a bit before my exams start on the 12th May (which also happens to be my birthday... not ideal!) Love G x |
HelloI'm Grace, a 18 year old runner, and fitness fanatic. Join me on my crazy journey through life, squeezing in an adventure in every second of spare time I have. Archives
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