400m and shot put PBs

Saturday was back on the athletics track.  Had a busy program with 6 events total.  First up was the 100m - the first 100m event since my hamstring injury 5 weeks earlier.  Took the first 40m a bit conservative, just to be safe, before going all out to the line.  Ran a respectable 13.19 into a 1.9 m/S headwind.  Now that I am confident I’m over my injury, I want to work on my start and acceleration.  I feel I’m still a fair way from getting all my power to the track early in the race.

From the 100, it was straight across to the shot put.  As I had long jump to follow 15 minutes later, the officials let me have my throws at the start of competition in quick succession.  My second throw was 6.09m, a PB by 15cm.  I’m sure that will improve a lot with practice.

At the long jump, I had a fairly ordinary day, as my head was totally not in the right space for jumping,  My first 2 jumps were pretty ordinary (3.63 and 3.65m).  Managed to find a bit of focus for my final attempt, with a 3.95m jump, but that was still more than 30cm short of my PB.

As soon as I finished at the long jump, it was time for the 400m.  Despite not feeling in the right place for the 400, I quickly got into stride and settled into a good race pace.  Unlike previous runs, I was able to focus on technique and maintain pace right up to the finish line, resulting in a PB of 1:02.48 (0.03 faster) on a day when many seemed to struggle, despite reasonable conditions.

After a couple of minutes to recover (if you have energy left after a 400m race, you’re not doing it right! ;) ), I headed off to the javelin.  First throw was a no throw (didn’t hit the ground point first).  Second throw landed perfectly, though it was only a bit over 11 metres.  I elected to pass on my third throw, as it was time to head over to the 4x100m relay.

In the relay, I ran first position again.  Got off to a good start and built up some good speed on the bend, finishing the run with a good baton change to our second runner.  With a mix of age groups, we weren’t going to win or break any records, but we did finish a respectable race with all changes being good.

The relay marked the end of a very busy, but successful day.  This week, there are two meets - a regular meet with the alternate program, in which I will be competing in the 200m, 60m, triple jump and discus on Thursday night, and a multi event meet on Saturday, where I have entered the pentathlon (200m, 1500m, discus, long jump, javelin).

- Tony via Tumblr http://ift.tt/2gB6Qvh