Back Racing

14 June - Challenge CamSur, my first race in 2015. Ha, this sounds a bit funny, as normally, half way through the season, I have maybe 10 races in my pocket…But this year is different because of the injury.

So I was actually very happy to be back in racing mood :-) I had almost forgotten how it felt to be nervous, how you have to be focused when preparing your bike and equipment for your race. So many things you have to actually do before you finally stand on the starting line :-) I kind of just watched Sticksy and did what he does. Since last year Brad has been my coach, so we do a lot of training together, and our race nutrition is almost the same. I think I just eat more for breakfast :-)

Challenge CamSur was a fast course, PB for athletes. This is what I needed for my first race - something not very difficult, as the half marathon in the race would be my longest run since the surgery. When we arrived to CamSur's little airport, we got a warm welcome from the Challenge family organisation, but we were also very warm (hot) welcomed by the local weather! It was so hot that we were sweating just from carrying our backpacks :-)

We had a few days to get used to the climate and I needed it because during the first day I found myself sweating in the pool during a recovery workout. I knew that this race would not be about real performance, but about mental toughness. It was going to be very hard for everyone, even local Philippinos were "complaining" about the heat.

Race day: (I don't like long description of the actual race, so he's my short version)

Felt good in the water, felt good on the bike for the first 70km, then I started to feel the heat and lack of energy in my legs. My body was telling me I simply couldn't stay with Simone on the bike. Coaches words stuck with me from that point on - "race your own race, it is going to be all about surviving the run…"

The run was really hot, the hottest race I have ever done! But I kind of enjoyed the run as I felt the knee was holding good and this was the most important thing! I was just telling myself "keep running to the next water/ice station…" and this made me finish in 2nd place.

Results:

1st Simone Braendi

2nd Radka Vodickova

3rd Jessica Fleming

Bonus:

The main race sponsor, governor of Camarine Sur Luis Miguel Villafuerte, found out that myself and Brad got engaged just a week ago, so he decided to invite all interested PRO athletes to a one day trip to CamSur islands!

We went and it was the best after race experience !