Birthday weekend!

What  a week!  Got a letter to say I'd been selected as third reserve for the British and Irish International Masters XC Championships at Belfast in November.  I'm surprised I have been selected as I have never competed in the British Masters National XC Champs and didn't take part in the national, southern or inter-counties xc champs last season; however, I'm not going to question the decision!  Although its highly unlikely that I will run for the team I will be able to compete in the open race as a reserve giving me the opportunity to show that I can compete at this level.  Flights to Belfast are booked!

After the track session on Monday night  and a recovery gym session on Tuesday and Wednesday morning I didn't feel that the longer reps at the track on a Wednesday would be beneficial with a race looming on Saturday so headed over to Nowton Park for a couple of easy laps before it got dark.  I took the day off on Thursday and after another gym session on Friday morning was set for the race on Saturday.

Saturday morning was my birthday.  Fortunately the Korean Grand Prix qualifying was televised early in the morning so I watched this before heading off for a couple of hours of work at the Suffolk Sports Injury Clinic.  After work we headed off to Braintree for the first race in the Essex Cross Country League.  I haven't competed in this league before although I had heard that the competition is of a very high standard and excellent preparation for the southerns, nationals and inter counties cross country championships.  There are six races in total, five of which are before Christmas with the remaining race in January leaving competitors free to concentrate on the championship races from the middle of January onwards.

I have decided to compete in this league rather than the Suffolk league as the majority of the Suffolk league races are after Christmas, continuing into February and March.  As the Suffolk league races tend to be 5.5 miles plus I find them too much of a drain on energy levels at the latter end of the season when its important to feel sharp and fresh for the championship races.  I also think it would be beneficial to compete with a different group of athletes at some different venues.

The course at the opening race of the Essex League was fairly undulating.  The senior women raced with the U23 women and U17 men so I expected a fast and furious start, and warmed up accordingly!  As predicted the start was pretty frantic.   I got myself into a good position early on and worked hard to maintain it. The race distance was 6k, so needed to be run like a 5k, going out hard and maintaining the pace for an extra kilometre.  I picked up a couple of places in the first half of the race and maintained the position until the finish.  I felt good, strong on hills both ascending and descending and had enough speed but wasn't able to accelerate during the last kilometre.  This doesn't seem to be an issue when I'm interval training at the track at a much quicker pace over a longer total distance so I think this is just due to a lack of race fitness.  Hopefully I'll see an improvement over the season.

I finished 6th lady which I was more than happy with.  Aside from being a bit rusty on the first lap and not sticking to my lines very well and the aforementioned lack of acceleration over the last kilometre I am very pleased with the first race of the season :-)

Straight after the race I chucked a track suit on and headed to London with Herbi to start the weekends celebrations.  We were staying at the Hilton and had booked afternoon tea.  We cut it a bit fine and only just managed to check in, wash the mud off and stick some civvies on in time for our reservation.

We took a leisurely walk from the hotel to Shaftesbury avenue for the evening performance of Les Miserables.  The show was brilliant, and to top the evening off when we returned to the hotel there was bottle of champagne, two slices of cake and a birthday card waiting for us.

Thankfully the BBC were televising the Korean Grand Prix live on Sunday morning so we were able to watch it in our room.  Really gutted for Jenson and looks like it will be a third title for Vettel :-(

Being a bit of a gym bunny I just had to spend an hour in the gym before checking out.  Nice cross trainer!  We headed back at lunchtime, in time for me to fit a 12 mile steady run in round Ickworth.

This weekend was the start of a few busy weeks of racing.  Next weekend is the Wix 5 mile race............