Time to Call it a Day, or Year...

Well I have finally come to a decision. It was a difficult decision for me but I know that I made the right one. I have decided to stop training for the season and take a break. After getting hurt a week after Nationals and struggling to get back into training after that, I just thought that I was going to have enough to prepare properly for a good race. I have been struggling with a lot of different things this year and I didnt want to end my season with yet another disappointment by putting myself in a situation that I wasnt prepared.

As I reflect on my season, I am extremely disappointed. Its hard to go from such a breakthrough year in 2009 to not improving from that in 2010. I know that I need to think about the positives and I did have personal bests over 5000m's and 10km's and those were two PB's that I really wanted to get. I also have to realize the different reasons why I struggled in the 2nd part of the season. The car accident was one thing that really hurt me mentally and I had such a hard time recovering from that. I am going to take this year as a learning experience and I am going to implement the things that I had wanted to for this past year. I am going to start doing weights again, I am going to keep building my mileage up since I realized that once I dropped my mileage at different times in the season that I tended to not do as well, I am going to try and race more often and most important, I am going to work on my mental toughness.

I have spent my first week off training in Florida with my mom, 3 sisters and niece. It has been a great trip and a nice way to get my mind off racewalking and just have a good time. I am looking forward to going home tomorrow and get into a regular routine. Tim and I wont be doing much travelling at all until Christmas time so im really looking forward to that!

Thanks for everyone's support over the past year. It has really helped me through a lot of the rough times and enjoy the good times! Talk to you all again in a few weeks as I begin my base training for the 2011 season!

Keep on walking,

Rachel