Week #1 Done!

After 3 weeks of rest after my very long season, I finally got back to training a week ago. So far things have been going well. Usually the first few times I racewalk after having my annual break, I usually feel awkward. This year was the first time that I can remember not feeling like that. I pretty much felt like I got back into racewalking, almost like I never stopped...until I look at my watch. My times are slower and my heart rate is higher but that is to be expected after having that much time off and not really doing much training if any at all.

Sunday I have the Ontario 20km RW Championships in Welland. I will not be racing this by any means. I will simply be participating and doing the 20km as a workout. So far the longest workout I have done is 12km's easy. Tomorrow I will walk 15km's and that will be the longest walk I do before Sunday's 20km. Im confident that I can walk around 2 hours comfortably. It will mostly just fun to be there and see so many faces that I havent seen since June at Nationals.

I have still been having problems with my left leg at the attachement of the glute and hamstring and so I managed to get an MRI appointment on Friday so hopefully something positive will come out from that.

Keep on walking,
Rachel

Disappointing Day in Berlin

Sorry it has taken me almost 2 weeks since my race to put up a post race report. If you saw the results you would have probably figured that I was pretty disappointed about how it went.

I had a very good last week of training and resting before the race. I remember feeling so happy with how easy training felt and how it was great how low my heart rate was. I was eating well and resting and drinking a lot. I didnt do anything unusual, I did everything that I did in preparation for any race.

The men's 20km race was the day before mine and the weather was pretty warm for them (around 25-28c) so I figured that the weather would be warm for my race also but the thought of it being over 30c never crossed my mind.

I ate really well the morning of the race and felt that I had eaten enough to last me through the race which started at noon. I got to the course and it was hot like I knew it would be. I figured it was around 30c which I have raced in once before in Brazil so I knew that I could do it but that I would have to have a different race plan, no personal best time today! I did usual 3km warm up with my heart rate monitor on and my HR was really high, too high. I didnt know if it was because of it being hot or because of nerves. I just shook it off and went to the call room. It was in a tent and it was super hot and we had to be in there 30 minutes before the start of the race. I just relaxed and stretched. When they brought us out to the start line, I really felt the heat, it was brutal but tried to not be bothered by it.

When the gun went off, all I was trying to think about was not being drafted by the whole group. I knew that they would all go out pretty fast so I was trying to stay back, even if that meant that I was in last place. I went through 1km's and my split was 4:53 and I was in last place! I tried to feel like I was easing into a pace and a good feeling but all I was feeling was a little heavy and tired, after a couple kilometers. I tried to keep up a good pace but I found myself going slower and slower as the race went on. I was just dead. I couldnt believe that this was happening to me in the biggest race so far in my life! This was my dream all season being in Berlin. I felt tired that I was racing so poorly when my parents flew all that way to see me race. I was feeling terrible but I didnt want to stop, I wanted to finish, I didnt want a DNF for my first World Championships. I felt like I was dragging my body to the finish line though. It was just terrible! The last lap I honestly felt and thought that I was going to fall over, if not then at the finish line. I managed to not fall until around the finish line when the volunteers kind of caught me. It was terrible. My body temperature was so high. At that point I knew that the weather had to be higher than 30c. When I saw my parents after the race, they had a thermomitor on their backpack and they said that it got up to 38c during the race, 38!!!!!! I just couldnt believe it. No wonder I felt so horrible! I ended up finishing in 35th place in a time of 1:45:45.

Right after the race, the only thing that made me feel somewhat ok was the fact that I was now on a break from training and could enjoy the rest of the time that I had in Berlin. It was nice touring around the city a bit with my parents and after they left, I went to the track to watch the rest of the meet everyday. It was so amazing seeing such incredible performances. It made me really motivated for when I get back training that I want to just continue to improve and be ready to come back in 2 years and do so much better. I have a lot more to improve and im looking forward to dropping more time on my personal best.

So far I have had almost 2 weeks off training and will have 1 more week to go before I have to start training again. I am doing the Ontario 20km Racewalk Championships on September 20th where all I have to do is win which will not be a problem at all. I will just do the race as a 20km workout. It should be fun to see everyone that I havent seen from the Canadian racewalk world again! For now though, I will continue to enjoy my break!

Keep on walking,

Rachel

Berlin Tomorrow, Race Sunday

My time in Kamen has gone very well. I have had very good training and have enjoyed my stay here with the other athletes. We havent had the nicest weather since Saturday. Its been overcast, 18c and sometimes raining lightly. Its been nice for training in the morning but for the rest of the day, its very gloomy.

On Saturday I did a Norwegian Fartlek and I felt great! My plan was to do the "hard" sections at around race pace or just under and I think I managed to do that. I felt very comfortable, relaxed and that I got into a very good rhythm. After that workout, I am feeling even more confident towards the race on Sunday. From now on I will just been doing easy walks except for Wednesday when I will do 5 X 1km at race pace just to do a little something to wake me up a few days before the race.

Part of the team leaves tomorrow for Berlin. I leave in the morning with some of the other distance athletes. I am really looking forward to getting over there. Its a 3.5 hour train ride to where we are staying now.

My parents will get to Berlin on Friday and we will probably get together on Saturday, the day before my race. I put a picture up from last years World Racewalk Cup because my race this weekend will just be like a World Cup, the only difference is that all of the other track and field events will be contested throughout the week also. Im not nervous (yet) thinking about the race because I have been to two World Cups already and I know that this race will have all the same girls and all the same protocalls so it will be nothing that I havent already experienced.

I wont update again before my race but I wanted to keep you all informed that I am feeling great and ready to go on Sunday! You can find the results at: http://berlin.iaaf.org/results/racedate=08-16-2009/bydate.html

Wish me luck :)

Rachel

In Kamen, Germany

I arrived in Germany yesterday after a long travel from San Diego. I arrived at 7:30am which I hate doing because you then have to try and stay awake all day to best adjust to the time difference. This time I have a 9 hour time difference so we will see how I deal with that compared to 6 hour difference from Toronto.

The training centre we are staying at is very nice. This is a picture of the centre and the town from an areal. There really isnt much to do around the town so we are sort of restricted to our rooms in a sense. Our rooms however are very nice. We all have our own room and they are very modern. I will be here until August 11th when I take a train to Berlin. There are quite a few bike paths here. The one that I have been training on is around a corn field which is sort of neat and different. I just have easy distance for most of the time I am here except for a Norwegian fartlek on Saturday and 5 X 1km on Wednesday. The race will come before you know it!

My parents decided to come to watch me so I am really excited about that. They will be staying with my good friend Sabine Krantz's parents house (the top German racewalker). I havent seen them since Nationals so it will be great to see them and to see them here! After my race we will do some sightseeing around Berlin. Im really looking forward to getting to Berlin!

Stay tunned,

Rachel

Last Hard Workout before Worlds!

Today I did my last hard workout of the year, I guess! Sounds kind of strange to be done all the hard work for the season. Things went very well today though. Tim walked with me to help me and we did 7 X 2km with 2:30 rest. I felt very good and strong. My heart rate was very low for me which was nice to see. We also took lactate four times. All results from today showed good fitness for me leading up to Berlin. Here are my times and lactates from today:

1st: 9:47

2nd: 9:45 (2.1 Lactate)

3rd: 9:44

4th: 9:45 (2.4 Lactate)

5th: 9:41

6th: 9:38 (3.2 Lactate)

7th: 9:35 (3.7 Lactate)

All of my times were either at or under race pace and my lactates didnt even reach the theoretical 4.0 which is the amount of lactate that you can hold for 20km race pace. I am now really looking forward to the race in Berlin as this workout shows that I am ready for another good time, hopefully a PB!

I leave on Monday morning for Germany! I am really looking forward to going and doing as well as I can! I also just found out that my parents will be coming to watch me so I am really excited about that!

Keep on walking,

Rachel

We're Going to BERLIN!!!!

Athletics Canada has just announced the 31 member team for the World Track and Field Championships and I am on the list!!! I found out last Wednesday but could not say anything until the official list came out! I was not expecting to be selected for the team so I am very excited about this opportunity! I have qualified off of the B standard which in Canada is called Rising Star.

I now leave on Monday, August 3rd for the pre-camp that is just outside of Dusseldorf, then on August 11th I will take a train to Berlin and then on August 16th is my race at noon.

I have now been in San Diego since I got back from Serbia. It has been good to be back here, training on th course I was on during most of my base season. I was able to get a good training week in last week and now this week will be good also. Then starting on Monday when I fly to Germany my training will start to go down again in preparation for the race.

You can follow the Canadian team in Berlin at http://athletics.ca/berlin2009/ and you can find the official results at http://berlin.iaaf.org/index.html.

Thanks for all your support in helping me qualify for this team!

Keep on walking,

Rachel

Success in Serbia!

My race went so well! I had high hopes for what I could do as a result but I manage to actually make my hopes a reality! My goal for this race was to break 1:38. My personal best time coming into the race was 1:38:30 and I was ranked very far back in the field.

My plan going into the race was to stay back from the lead group and let them go as fast as they want and for me to try and go as close to my goal pace as possible which was 9:48 per 2km loop. There was no 1km split in the 2km loop so on the first lap, it was really hard to tell how fast or slow I was really going. I felt great though and my heart rate was pretty low (high 180s). When it came up to the first lap being finished, I heard the lead packs split time of 9:52 and I was behind them so I knew I was going too slow. I hit my lap split and I was at 10:04, WAY too slow! Once I saw that I immediately thought that I needed to start going. My next lap was 9:39 and I was feeling good but thought then that 9:39 was a little too fast for this early in the race. I kept my eyes on the other competitors ahead of me and just tried to stay focused on them and staying relaxed. I just kept clicking off laps in the low 9:40s and the high 9:30s. None of the splits fazed me. I went through 10km's in 48:48, roughly the time I wanted to do for my first half.

The second half of the race continued to go well as I started clicking off all my splits in the 9:30s. I couldnt believe how great I still felt. By 14km's I was in the top 10 among all of the competitors which I was so thrilled about. At that point, I was just hoping for my placing to stay in the top 10 and for me to continue around the same pace so that I was able to fulfill breaking 1:38. I then moved into top 8 and then top 6 and by 16km's I was in 6th with 2 other girls chasing me down. When I hit the 16km split I was at 1:17:34 and was thinking that if I managed to do around the same pace that I was doing that I would be able to break 1:37!!! Well under my time goal. However, by 17km's my legs had a different plan for me. I could no longer keep up the leg speed that I had been doing the whole race and slowed down quite a bit. Once my legs seized a bit, I was just trying to finish. I hit the 18km split in 9:52, way slowed down! One lap to go and the 2 girls that were chasing me down, now I was chasing them but they had much more in them then I did. I ended up finishing my last lap in 9:56 and finishing the 20km's in 1:37:22, a minute and 8 second personal best time! I also finished 8th place, much higher place then I could have imagined! I beat so many other girls that had much higher personal best times then I did!

Even though I slowed down considerably the last 2 laps of the race, I was so thrilled anyways! I beat my goal by much more than I could have imagined. My time also puts me eligible to be selected for the Canadian World Track and Field Championships team that will be competing in Berlin, Germany in mid August. My time 'only' achieved the B standard so this means that it is not an automatic that I make the team so I will have to wait till July 26th to find out if they select me or not.

Here are all my splits from the race:

1st: 10:04

2nd: 9:39 (19:44)

3rd: 9:43 (29:27)

4th: 9:42 (39:09)

5th: 9:38 (48:48)

6th: 9:35 (58:24)

7th: 9:32 (1:07:56)

8th: 9:37 (1:17:34)

9th: 9:52 (1:27:26)

10th: 9:56 (1:37:22) *2nd 10km split: 48:34*

I really feel like this year has been a big breakthrough for me now that I have finally improved enough to make it worthwhile to chase an Olympic berth in 2012. I have improved on my 20km time by 2 minutes and 35 seconds this year! I am hoping to continue my improvement this coming year. If I dont qualify for Berlin then I plan on going to the USA 15km Racewalk Championships that will be held in Minneaplois on August 15th to try and beat my 10km PB one more time. Then I will take a much deserved break from training before I start to prepare for next year.

The rest of my trip was really good. I got to relax a bit and not worry so much about anything and just have fun. I went and watched the rest of the track and field events and did some sight seeing. Overall it was a really good trip.

Tuesday myself and the rest of the team travelled from Serbia to Toronto. The next day I travelled to San Diego where I am now for a little while. Its so great to be here again since I havent been here since April. I have a lot of wedding planning to do while keeping up some good training in hopes of competing in Berlin. Ill keep you all updated on what Athletics Canada decides.

Keep on walking,

Rachel