going for the gold

sorry for the long time in posting. if you are a distance runner and a postman, then december is one of the busiest months of the year, for the parcels, christmas cards and the fact that it is generally considered to be a good month to considerably step up the quantity of training that you do. add on to that the fact that i am also taking driving lessons again, this means that i have very little time to my self apart from the 2 hours that i set aside in the afternoon to sleep. this though didn't stop me from making the trip down to millfield school for the avon and somerset cross country championships, where my efforts over the 10.1k course (some people thought it was longer than that, but that doesn't matter in cross country as it is all about positions and not times) were rewarded by firstly beating jerry hogan for the first time in a non track race, by over a minute, nearly beating jonathan goodland for the first time being thwarted by a attack of stomach cramps on the final lap, 7 seconds being the closest i have ever got to him, and a gold medal for being the sixth and final scoring runner for bristol who were the champion club for 2007, although wells city harriers international runner ben tickner was the somerset champion and avon champion was craig peters, although why they run seperate competitions for avon and somerset is beyond me as it unnecessarily dilutes the quality of the competition.

in the race, which also incorporated the final race of the south west league and the wessex league i finished 39th out of about 120 ish and 14th in avon, although thuis by no means makes me the 14th cross country runner in avon as there were some highly notable absentees like rob whalley ben noad frank tickner, who last year completed a clean sweep of all the cross country championships (european trials, world trials, 'the national' and the inter-counties championships) and together they formed the inter-counties winning side so they would be fairly formidable opposition. the course it self was fairly muddy but flat, not that that forms any worries for me as i am starting to get to grips with cross coutry a lot more now than what i thought i ever would. maybe one day i can repeat the succes at the avon and wiltshire track and field champs one day or at a higher level. i am still progressing as an athlete and whilst science dictates that i wont make it to the top, you should never under estimate what hard work and determination can do.

the next race for me on the country at least is the south west intercounties champs which also doubles up as the south west club champs. with the strength in depth that avon and somerset have it is highly unlikely that i will be picked for the county team as the previously mentioned athletes will almost certainly be picked it would be a huge confidence boost for me if i could beat some of the runners from the other counties as this would confirm my belief that one day i will eventually be capable of competing at this level, whether it is one the track (unlikely) the mud or the road (there are loads of inter counties road champs that don't get much publicity. i'm going to try and further my cause at weston tonight on the 5 mile prom run...its as good a starting point as any