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Back after my two weeks of
holiday, fist holiday since I started this amazing journey of
being a full time track sprinter.
My orders from my coach for the holiday was NO TRAINING…. But,
that’s not a holiday for me. Usually my holiday is more a
training camp as taking rest. I secretly had a few coffee
rides on my bike and I may have done two or three gym session,
nothing to the extreme, it's just to get the blood flowing.
It was good seeing my family and spending time at the farm and
working on my socializing skills that I felt needed work after
few months intensive training.
Back to Switzerland…
After two weeks of hard training, I was not happy, mentally or
physically, was it a good idea taking a holiday? Was two weeks
off too much? I keep thinking about if the holiday did me any
good, from not having a holiday in more then 20 months and
then from doing nothing for two weeks, thinking to myself, did
my body just shut down completely.
My times where slow, my legs did not cope with the hard
training, I was negative and to be honest, I was sad. All that
hard work from before the holiday was for nothing. Feeling I
was in such good shape and thinking the holiday will do me
wonders, did the opposite. If I knew that the holiday would
give me such disadvantage I would have not taken a holiday.
I know my body does need its rest at some point; it is just
something I have to teach myself being a newbie in track
cycling and full time athlete. After time I will learn how my
body copes to different recovery strategy and rest periods.
After being at the center for three weeks, training with Nicky
Degrendele from Belgium and making a new friend made things
positive for me, I enjoyed training with her and pushing each
other on the track and gym, she may be young but I learned a
lot from her, having years of experience.
I had some racing lying ahead. I was positive thinking that it
will be just what I needed to get back on track and give my
legs a wake-up call but at the same time I was not looking
forward to seeing how much work I needed and how far behind I
was.
Grenchen being the first race on Thursday, only doing the
sprint. Being familiar with this race I knew it was a very
small race with no big competition, I can just enjoy myself
and really get into it. Finishing the night of with a win in
the sprint, now for the weekend racing in Bourges, Coupe de
France Fenioux Piste 3. The nerves started, knowing what girls
I will be racing against from previous races.
It was a long drive from 6-7 hours, managed to get on the
track when arriving to loosen the legs. The track was 200m
(happy as I am currently training on a 200m track in Aigle at
the World Cycling Center) the banking was longer and the
straights was very short, making race tactics very important
as it’s very hard to pass on this track.
Qualifing went better then expected, new race PB of 11.32 and
a new South African record, not by much but that means I was
progressing. Was hoping sprinting in the late 11.10. Having
qualified second I was confident.
I managed to take the first match sprint and went straight to
the semi finals that was held late evening.
My First match Sprint that evening was against Helena Casas,
this girl has a lot of power, unfortunately she took the win
in both heats. I was now sprinting it out for third place
against Méllisandre Pain, going along side her we bumped a few
times and I just remember my coach always saying, “keep your
line Bernette and you need to be a bit more aggressive staying
there.”
We were going pretty fast and we bumped again and I just see
her flying over her handle bars and me trying to keep my
handlebars straight and not going down with her, I managed to
stay up, but Méllisandre had a hard crash. We ended up not
racing again because of her injury.
It was not the way I wanted to take the third place that
night, but it's track cycling, always unexpected.
Finishing off the competition with another third place in the
keirin before a long drive back to Aigle, I was more
determined then ever to get back to training the next week and
give it my everything.
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