THE GERMAN CHAMPS - An honest reflection on a crazy day!
THE GERMAN INDOOR COMBINED EVENTS CHAMPIONSHIPS 2022...
So where do we begin?!
This weekend saw Laura compete in the senior women's pentathlon at the German championships. I'm going to share with you how the day went, the highs, lows and a little background on what it took to get there!
This story begins way back in 2017 when I got an email from a German athlete who was coming to Newcastle for 6 months and was looking for a group to train with. At the time I had a multi events group based in Gateshead and Laura was just starting out in her journey from high jumper to heptathlete. I told her to come down to the track, and for 6 months we worked hard! At the end of the 6 months Laura went back to Germany, however I continued to help and guide her from a far.
Laura would train with her group in Germany but would travel to the UK for our national competitions and would join the group on training camps. In 2019 I went to Germany to help Laura prepare for her German champs and it was not long after this camp that I became Laura's full time coach.
Fast forward to 2020 and we all know what happened..Covid!
We made the decision to embrace the situation, and I made the decision to document the journey via social media.
Laura was left in Germany with minimal equipment and no track access, whilst I was stuck in the UK.
Whattsapp and facetime became our go to and we used the True coach app to track everything. I started posting on tiktok and people were able to get an insight into this weird but wonderful Coach-athlete partnership!
Fast forward to September 2021 and after almost 2 years of training hard, with some but not lots of competitions Laura was reflecting on what had been an average track season.
We spoke in depth at how amazing it was that she had overcome so much adversity to even be competing that season, however it was now time for her to take a serious step up!
We discussed mentality, over training, nutrition and loads of other factors and Laura promised me a fire had been lit and she was going into winter 21/22 a new athlete with a new mindset.
Over the last few months I have continued to document the training on tiktok and instagram, thousands of people have joined the journey and what a journey it has been.
At times I wondered whether documenting everything was a good idea, did we show too much, was I setting up Laura to fail? Looking back though its one of the best things I could have done. We have a catalogue of footage to look back on, we have a training diary of progression and we have been able to motivate and inspire others along the way.
SO, WHAT ABOUT THE GERMAN CHAMPS?!!
I was unable to attend the German Champs this year, so it was down to Laura and her boyfriend Pascal to navigate the competition with me on whattsapp and live results following back home.
Going in to the comp, after so many 4th places in previous years, the goal was to medal, to score a pb and to finish healthy...
EVENT 1 - 60m Hurdles
I wrote on Laura's programme a target time of 8.90s and she did just that. A great start to the day and a new PB! Laura is not a natural hurdler but we have worked extremely hard in this event over the last few years and it is paying off.
EVENT 2 - High Jump
Laura was once a high jumper and boasts a brilliant pb of 1.85m the goal today though was to be solid, to hit all the positions and jump 1.72m+. Again she hit the target on the head, yet we all came away a little disappointed. One of my goals is to get Laura back to being a 1.80m+ jumper and I honestly believe this is very close to coming to fruition. In this comp she was finding some ping we haven't seen in a long time, however she couldn't quite get the timing right and she left a few points out there.
EVENT 3 - Shot Put
This for me was a big disappointment. Honestly Shot put is a struggle for Laura but she works on it a lot! She doesn't have the confidence in her ability here that I have in her. Although we haven't seen it in the results yet I do have faith in her really improving this event across this year.
She opened up with a safe 10.64m, I hate the term 'safe' in the shot put. As it is such a low scoring event, you just have to go for it and that's how you gain points. She improved to 10.86m in round 2 and I wont show you the whattsapp messages but its safe to say I wasn't happy. She pulled out an 11.17m in the final round which salvaged things a little but this wasn't a great result. Of course she was now sat in 4th place overall! The goal here was 11.50m+ so although it wasn't far off we have plenty to work on!
EVENT 4 - Long Jump
If I sounded like a hyper critical coach in the last event, well now I'm a hype man cheer leader for this event, as long jump was awesome. I told her if she wants to win this competition she needs to get out there and win the long jump event. She started with a 5.77m which was enough to be in medal contention but wouldn't be enough to challenge for gold. Round 2 she went out to 5.96m and I was buzzing! I was following on the live results and shouting the house down. This wasn't a pb jump but it was a competitive performance. This is the fire Laura had promised me back in September, this was her finally believing in herself and how good she could be. Round 3 and she hits 6.01! To say I was over the moon would be an understatement. She would lead into the last event the 800m, and I couldn't have been prouder of her performance in that long jump comp. The goal in the long jump was 5.90m+ so we know a pb score is well and truly on at this point.
EVENT 5 - 800m
So we were in new territory. Normally at this point of a pentathlon or heptathlon Laura is working out the points, what does she need to come 3rd or grab a medal, who does she need to beat etc etc. This time it was different, she was the leader, but only by 30 points or around 3 seconds in the 800m. I told her to keep it simple, win the race, go out hard at the start and bring it home strong.
She had spent the last 2 years running on her own, in the cold and rain and wind. At times we didn't know if there would be competitions, when she would get to line up, but we knew she was doing all she could to make sure she would be ready when the time come.
This was it, the wait was over this was the time to shine. She went out hard, 32 at 200m, 65 at 400m she lost the lead between lap 3 and 4 but she kicked and finished with a sprint to win the race and claim the gold. So there we have it after years of coming 4th she was now the GERMAN CHAMPION with a hurdles pb and a new pentathlon PB by almost 150 points!
Its a few days later now as I write this blog and we are still on a high from the weekend, we have loads of new things to work on and another comp this weekend.
The moral of this story is that consistent hard work pays off, keep turning up, keep your head high. Trust in the process, your programme, your coach and yourself. NEVER EVER GIVE UP