Weekly Recap #8 – 05/01/2020

“A race is a work of art that people can look at and be affected in as many ways they’re capable of understanding.”

Steve Prefontaine

The big double two oh is upon us. The blog officially has a purpose! All the posts before this meant nothing to me. They were just one night stands of blog posts, practicing for when the real thing came along. Now it has… and I’m ready for a committed relationship. Honestly, sometimes I don’t understand my own metaphors 😂

My Week In Numbers

Okay so, my body decided to have a bit of a meltdown this week . My Monday run was supposed to be steady; getting on for a minute a mile quicker than reality. Then on Tuesday my hip started flaring up so I bailed on the session half way through.

Monday – 10.2 miles attempted steady @ 7:17 min/mile.
Tuesday – 2.4 mile WU, 3.2 miles Bailed Session, 1.2 mile CD.
Wednesday – REST? (Had to look up the word).
Thursday – 7.9 miles treadmill @ 7:40 min/mile, 30 min sauna.
Friday – 6.5 miles treadmill @ 7:45min/mile, 25 min sauna.
Saturday – 1.4 miles WU, Hampshire Champs XC – 2nd place and 1st Team 🎉, 1.9 miles CD.
Sunday – 15 miles long run @ 7:06 min/mile.
Totals: 56.3 miles in 6hrs and 39mins.

This is not what you want leading up to the race. I had to make a judgement and rest up to settle the hip on Wednesday. But was it worth it? Let’s find out.

Hampshire XC Champs 2020

The story begins in 2019, specifically June 2019. My calf made the decision to tear itself just as I was entering the track season, rendering me useless. I had no goals, no focus, little to no drive. I needed a goal… a purpose. This became gaining my first Hampshire vest in the cross country this year. I jumped on the indoor bike and got to work.

I have trained way harder in the last few months than any other period in my life. I knew I was in good shape, my coach even told me to try and medal. So when race day came I had to make it happen.

“Ready…. Go!” The start of any XC race is manic. Guys who deep down know they won’t finish highly try to win the race within 400m, they’re trying to punch higher than my girlfriend. I stayed calm and slowly moved through the pack. About 1K in, a front group started to form, I did a quick head count, “there’s 7 blokes there” I thought. There are only 8 county vests available… I made my first move.

Gap bridged, the real race began. As position means everything in XC you need to make your rivals hurt. Little surges helped keep the pace honest and stretched out that initial front group. I moved up to keep an eye on what was going on. Two boys had broken away, Zak Mahamed (recently ran for GB U20 in XC) and Andy Greenleaf (a 2:21 marathon runner)…. I made my second move.

I worked passed Andy, even putting in a slight effort so he couldn’t tuck in behind. Zak was next, well kind of, I caught the man and actually took the lead for all of 10mins. But with around 2.5K to go Zak decided to stop playing around and dropped me harder than Iran-USA relations. (Let’s joke about it whilst the Earth still exists, eh?)

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2nd place though! 2nd bloody place. This is way more than I had expected back in June and should hopefully get me that vest! I came 12th place in 2019 so I’m buzzing with the result. FYI if you see me I WILL show you my medal (if you’ll pardon the pun). I am going to flex that thing more than someone using chopsticks in Wagamama’s. Also, big kudos to all the SAC boys, we came first as a team too!

Anyways, that’s all for this week folks. Hopefully, I can recover the hip ready for the next big one… Chichester 10K on 02/02. Sub-30 attempt pending…

Lot’s of love,
Will xx