Follow Nora Hubbell formerly of Mt Desert Island now at the University of Southern Maine as she blogs about her first collegiate indoor season. Hubbell has already found success at USM, being named the Little East Rookie of the Week after her first competition.
I’m a college student now. It’s been incredibly surreal adjusting to this because in some ways I feel like I shouldn’t be here yet. Despite said weirdness, college has been excellent so far.
For me, December was a blur. I transitioned to a more intense level of training, I went to a college orientation and signed up for classes, I competed in my last high school meet ever, and now I’m settling into the next stage of my life.
I’ve only been here for a week, so I can’t begin to know all of the weird ins and outs of college life, but I’m starting to get the hang of things. Track has been invaluable in this respect. Instead of arriving here without knowing anyone, I’ve been dropped, so to speak, into a group of people who thus far have been welcoming and helpful.
From a running perspective, despite a rough first workout, this season is shaping up to be the best I’ve had in a long time. I can’t tell if the change in my training plan or the new environment is the reason for this, but it’s been a huge relief to feel more normal again. The week started out on a rough note, however. I did an interval workout on Monday--5 x 800--and while the times were about where I needed them to be, I hit a mental block about two thirds of the way through. It’s not an unusual place for me to falter, but it was a particular reoccurring block that I’d hoped I had left behind on MDI. As is my typical response to a situation like this, I took a minute to swear a bit in my head, reset my mentality, and then proceeded to push through as best as possible, despite being a bit rattled by the incident.
However, my Wednesday workout went better. It was the first one that I did with my new coach, a set of repeats starting with a 600m and working down to 200m repeats. I felt absolutely fantastic. I ended up reducing the recovery period for the last few repeats and at the end if my coach had asked if I wanted to add on some more 200s there’s a solid chance I would’ve jumped at the opportunity, if it hadn’t meant putting off eating dinner. I think the workout surprised him in a good way, which is a good way to start of the year.
My first meet completely exceeded my expectations. I was running the 800 and the mile leg of the DMR. I didn’t expect much out of the meet, since I’d put more pressure on myself to perform well at the USM relays and then didn’t have the race I’d wanted. Coming into a new level of competition I had no idea how I’d be doing, and I didn’t want to make myself too anxious. My strategy was basically to sit and be in a position to kick at the end, depending on how fast the race went out. I never really remember what happens during races, but I tried to sit with the first couple girls for the first two laps. I almost got boxed in, but not nearly as badly as at USM relays, so it didn’t end up affecting the race as much. With a little more than a lap to go I managed to catch up to one of my teammates, who was leading the race. She outkicked me by a tenth of a second, which I kind of expected since she’s more of a sprinter than I am, but finishing second and PRing by five seconds was a more than satisfactory start to college. I hope everyone else is having a good start (or middle, at this point) of their seasons!
