I received two BIG results this week: my blood test results and my exam results! Let's start with the blood test. The doc said everything was ok apart from the vitamin D reading, which was a bit low. He said this was important because some recent research suggested that vitamin D makes a difference to performance. He said being low on vitamin D can cause a feeling of tiredness and weakness. As a result he gave me a prescription to pick up some Vitamin D tablets, which I just realised, as I'm writing this blog, is what I was supposed to do when I went to Tesco this morning but completely forgot, bollocks. I'm also under orders to sunbath a lot as the skin converts sunlight into vitamin D (maybe another reason the Africans are better than us, they get a lot sunlight). He also sent me two papers with some research on them about vitamin D and performance which are very scientific, I tried to read them but got lost in all the big, fancy words. I did manage to string a few sentences together and sort of pick up that low vitamin D can make you tired, like the doc said. He also said I might have something called "Unexplained under-performance" or "Overtraining syndrome", which basically means I'm tired from the winter. He said he looked at my training and even though it is not as much as some people, it is still quite hard. He recommended I take a week off then have an easy week of training then resume normal training after that. Even though it is the middle of summer he reckons it will help me if I take some time out rather than train through it. That rules out racing for a while now which means I'm going to miss AAA's. I think this a good thing though as running was a bit rubbish last week, I didn't enjoy it that much.

The other set of results were the ones which would decide where I would be running next year, either back in London at home or in Birmingham with another year of education. Fortunately I passed everything and made it into the second year of Mathematics at Birmingham. You need an average of 40% from 6 or 7 modules to go through and I averaged 63%, which is a 2,1 I think, 7% of a 1st; not bad for someone who did limited revision. My tutor said he was expecting better from me but understands that I put a lot of focus into running and that next year I need to put more effort into my studies as from now on everything I do will count towards the final degree. He reckons I could come away with a 1st if I put the work in and said I should consider doing a masters, but I think that might be a bit beyond me at the moment. But like he said, it's IF I put the work in.

Not much has else has happened on the running side of things, which is why there is a big paragraph above about my uni work! Like I said earlier, last week was a bit rubbish as in both my track sessions I didn't even get half way through them because I was wasted. I was speaking to a running mate from London last week (via the luxury of Facebook chat) and he mentioned I didn't seem like I was into running that much at the moment. He was right and I said it was probably because I don't think I'm running that well at the moment. During the winter I was confident going into every race because I knew I was training well and running fast, so I would be willing to hurt myself as much as possible so I would win. Although people say I looked easy at the National and Inter-Counties, I was actually dying inside but because of the confidence, I could fight through it. At the moment I'm not convinced I'm in good shape because I've looked back at my training and haven't done many sessions this summer which tell me I'm running well, it's just the odd session here or there, I haven't done a good few weeks hard work yet. The way things work with me is if I'm training well, I'll race well. A prime example is two years ago at the Crystal Palace BMC 1500M D race. In that race I produced my only ever sub 60 last lap in a distance over 800m, ran a 3 second PB and won the race. Prior to that I had just come back from training in Portugal with Steve and was running well but even though I was mashed in the race, I was still able to kick on because I knew I was in good shape. I'm not one of these people who can race well off nothing, unfortunately I'm just not that good, I need some good sessions behind me for some confidence. So once I come of this break hopefully I can get some solid work in and then race well. It's lucky I'm not doing the AAA's because I entered the 1500, and the way the guys are running and how unsettled my head is while running, it would only end in disaster for me.

So, moral of this weeks blog: what you put in is what you get out.

Considering not much has happened that's quite a big write up. Until next time,

Goolab xxx        

PS someone asked for pictures to brighten up the blog, so here they are: