Week of February 2nd- February 8th
Monday: 10 minute warm up, 6x400 repeats at 800ish pace, cool down
Tuesday: 25 minute run
Wednesday: 10 minute warm up, 6x200 repeats, 2 sets of “find the purple sticky notes our coach stuck around the school” scavenger hunts (boys vs. girls)
Thursday: day off… team pizza party and tie-dying t-shirts
Friday: 20 minute run, 4 strides, ice bath
Saturday: EMITL CHAMPIONSHIPS!!
Sunday: off
Training Recap: I really like tapering. There’s just something about it that makes everything seem more laid back, even though things should seem way more stressful because of Championships. This week we did all but one of our workouts inside, so our coach came up with ideas to make running around the halls less boring. While we were warming up and doing 200 repeats, our coach ran around the school sticking purple sticky notes in random places, like on the walls, inside the microwaves and under the water fountains. The game was that whichever team found the most sticky notes (boys or girls) got prizes (the girls won every time)…. Overall, the whole week was a lot of fun, and there was a lot of team bonding, which was great because pretty soon our numbers will keep getting smaller.
Meet Recap: So I was seeded to run the triple in this meet… mile, 800, 2 mile. I was so mentally prepared to do well that I had gone over every possible scenario for each of my races in my head over and over again until I reached the point where I just wanted to get them over with. The outcome of the meet was much different than I expected, however. The mile was first, and I definitely felt ready to run. I was a little worried about the amount of recovery time between my events and the fact that I had missed the last meet because I was sick, but after warming up and getting on the starting line I had a lot of energy. There were so many girls in our heat that when the gun went off, Michelle Haluska got trampled by one of the girls behind her and they fired the gun for us to come back and restart. It was really a bummer, because I could tell that it must have been such a mental setback for her before the race. It was also surprising because I don’t think I’ve ever been in a race where there was a restart. After the second start, I just tried to get out there and hold a good position, because I knew Brianne Dunn would be right on my shoulder like always. It turned out that the pace was too fast though, because my first 400 was around a 5 minute mile pace, and it just went downhill from there. I tried to hold the pace throughout, but by the time they rang the bell for the last lap, I could feel myself getting dizzy. All I could do in the last lap was just go as fast as I could and hope Brianne didn’t catch me in the last straightaway. She did. It’s probably one of the worst feelings to get passed right at the finish line, because there is just that instant of shock, and then the race is over. There’s just nothing you can do about it. Brianne ran a really smart race though, and I could tell she was really excited. I ran a decent time, a 5:31, but the mile definitely threw off the rest of my meet. The dizziness and fatigue I felt in the last couple laps of the mile are some of the symptoms of an electrolyte imbalance that I have had for a few years. I don’t really understand why it happens, but it really sucks. The mile seemed like only a minor case of it, because I didn’t actually collapse or anything like I have before during cross country, but the dizziness didn’t go away even after the race was over.
By the time the 800 came around I was still kindof out of it, but I started the race anyway because I knew that if I scratched the 800 it would automatically scratch me for the 2mile. My goal was just to finish the race and try not to make things worse by running too fast. I was fine for the first two laps, I just tucked in behind the leaders and went off their pace, but about halfway through I could feel the dizziness getting worse again, so I slowed way down and ended up coming across the finish last in my heat, running a 2:41 or something. It was definitely humbling to be seeded first in an event and then to get dead last, but I think I probably deserved that sort of a check to my ego.
After the 800 my coaches told me that they were going to scratch me from the 2 mile. At first I was upset, because I ran the 800 so that I could still do the 2mile, and I also just wanted another chance to do better. I was ok with not running it in the end though, because it gave one of my teammates a better chance at placing in the 2mile, and at that point in the meet there was no way we were going to catch Bangor or Brewer, and we were a solid number of points ahead of the 4th place team. It also meant I got to actually watch the 2mile too. It’s a good thing I didn’t risk running a hard 2mile and making things worse for states, which is what really matters.
So overall, even though the meet didn’t go quite how I expected, my dizzy spells really made me realize that this can’t keep happening, and that I have to get to the bottom of what is really wrong with me if I want to continue running in college. I am going back to the doctors to get some tests done and hopefully find out how to prevent this from happening any more. The good thing is that so far I have never felt these symptoms two meets in a row, so I should be all set for states!