February ~ The Romance Continues

Between me, myself and I.

I didn't mention this in the previous race report because it was that. A race report. Some of you may have noticed at the bottom, however, an addition.
ZEALOUS Swimwear must have liked what they saw in my proposition for an ambassadorship. They've got some quality gear and these days its all about looks, they have it all covered! Glad to be on the team.

The only semi-relevant photos for the month would be ones in relation to Valentines Day - which was spent in a hotel room alone, watching Valentines Day - and ones from The Australian Sprint Championships. Which have already been used. So no photos in this edition of the 'updates'.

Instead here is something I saw in the twitter-sphere the other day. It went exactly like this:

"Opportunity follows struggle. It follows effort. It follows hard work. It doesn't come before."

Brilliant string of words. Borderline preach-able I'd say!



The decision to race at the Australian Sprint Championships in Elwood wasn't a huge surprise. Deep down I had a feeling it was coming and I did want to race but only felt I wasn't up to it just yet. However, in the end I was quite happy after a few days of letting the thought sink in.
The shock was a proposed decision to race Devonport OTU Olympic Distance Championships.
On a Monday afternoon run just a week before the Australian Sprint Championships at Elwood Keiran said to me
"So have you entered for Devonport?"
"why!" I said.
Quite literally more a statement than a question. I made comment that I'd rather race Elwood and have the chance to recover properly and also the opportunity to squeeze a little bit more out of myself in the few weeks before Mooloolaba Continental Cup.
I feel that he agreed, albeit reluctantly.

Whilst waiting in the ASADA doping control room a few hours after I crossed the line at Elwood he'd brought up Devonport again. My performance had given me confidence in my ability so I was more easily persuadable at this point in time. Still unsure about it though.
Nothing had been set in stone and we were still struggling with the decision a few days later.

Usually Keiran has a clear cut and very reasonable answer. But this time he was still as unsure as I were. The stakes stood at seizing the opportunity to race Australia's best athletes and in turn not recovering in time for the bigger focus, of which is Mooloolaba.
Or not to take the opportunity at Devonport to see how I rack up against the best Kiwi's and Aussies and aim to have a cracker at Mooloolaba.
We were running out of time so I decided asking for other opinions would be somewhat of a step forward, hopefully in the right direction.

I sent a message to Keiran saying would you mind if I asked for Craig Walton's opinion, immediately Keiran called me back.
Semi expecting a "why?" I answered, and straight away Keiran giggled and opened the conversation with
"I just got off the phone to him."

Wunderbar!!

He said that Craig mentioned I won't get the opportunity to race in a quality field like this very often. And if we get the recovery right then it will not be a problem at all to race both.

And thus the decision was final. Devonport OTU Olympic Distance Championships was next on the agenda.