Early morning and hubby gets up and drops me to the airport. Its a crystal clear day here in Nelson. A nice sparkly frost but clear Sky's, I can only hope that Wellington gives up the same.
Its a quick uneventful flight and I just parked up and listened to my MP3 and tried not to think about any thing.
One of the organisers kindly picks me up from the airport and takes me out to the event. Trentham is about a 40min drive from the airport. The day is glorious, I cant rave enough about it as it was so not a typical Wellington day. Not a breath of wind, no clouds in the sky...just beautiful hot sun shine.
When we arrived I wondered over and started chatting away with other competitors and we all got so engrossed in our chat that time just flew and before I knew it I had to quickly race over to the change rooms and get ready so I could spend time warming up. I went through my list of drills and stretches and then did a few quick 100mts to get my heart rate up. I had started hydrating the day before as I still felt off colour and thought the extra fluids would be a help.
I was hoping to do a fantastic time of at least 60mins. Its a nice flat course so I had a great chance of doing so. The course was a 2km lap with a tight dogs leg just past the 1km mark but other than that it was a nice fairly straight course. I was getting nervous as the start loomed.
We all lined up and we're off in a flurry of feet and arms. I zipped out in front to follow close to Peter Bailey (a top NZ walker) and thought gosh I feel great but its a bit quick. I kept going thinking that if I get far enough out front I just need to maintain that.....(that was my first mistake!!) My first lap was 11.32....I knew then it was too fast. As we rounded for our second lap I could here the feet of a walker gaining on me and it took another kilometre for her to catch me up. We tussled back and forth for a further 500m and then I thought I would just tuck in behind her and wait till the last lap (This was my second mistake!!) very slowly she pulled away from me and each time I would push to catch she would increase too, which really played havoc with me mentally. I just couldn't gain on her. By my 4th lap (the 8km mark) I had run out of energy and lost my bounce (as the judges put it) and I guess mentally I had given up too. It was getting very hot out on the course and I had not grabbed a water yet. So on my last lap I got some water, gave myself a stern talking to and dug it in, but it was a little too late. Coming second didn't bother me in the least, but clocking in at 1:01:30 did. I was very disappointed in myself as I knew I had blown it. I had gone out too quick and had let myself give up.
But the most positive of all was getting NO Marks on the board and NO warnings!!! And that was the main reason for going across. I also had all the judges come over and offer advise and compliment me on my style and my progress over the last couple of years. So all in all a great trip. I know now what needs to be improved and where I need to focus more energy with my training and that is distance...I need to be doing longer distances for endurance. The speed will come back again.
Here are my lap times and I will post some photos as soon as the club puts them up on their site.
Nyle Sunderland #1- 11:32 #2- 12:19 #3- 12:27 #4- 12:40 #5- 12:32 total - 1:01:30
2 comments:
Congratulations, Nyle! Loved reading your race report! I know how you feel about going out too fast at the start of a race. It is something I need to work on as well.
You look really great in the pics - sorry you didn't meet your time goal, but you DID meet your other goals and you are staying positive. Keep up the good work :).
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