Entry 1: Constitutional Law
I must admit I was a bit surprised when asked to write this blog for AA as it feels like an eternity since I’ve even stepped onto a track (three and a half months to be exact). Nonetheless I’ll do my best to give you an insight into what I’ve been doing on and (predominately) off the track since the start of the year. I apologize in advance that my blog doesn’t contain the abundance of metaphors and hilarious quip that the Athletics Australia readers have come to expect from the likes of Tristan Thomas!
Ironically I am writing this in the same week that I should’ve been suffering from the aftermath of the dreaded long-haul flight to Europe. Instead, I’m staring across my desk at the other, far less inspiring challenge that awaits me for the latter half of the year; an assortment of unopened textbooks titled Constitutional Law, Legal History, and Political Economy.
For those who are unaware I tore my adductor tendon a few days before the world indoor championships back in March, which has significantly derailed my aspirations for 2010. The year started off in a promising manner with some good jumping throughout the revamped Australian Athletics Tour, followed up with a bronze medal at world indoors and nomination in the Commonwealth Games team. All was looking good for the year ahead until, while trying not to sound overdramatic, disaster struck and the results of my MRI became known. I won’t bore you with the intricacies of my injury suffice to say I’ve spent far too much time on the physio table and not enough time on the track as of late. The problem lies in the fact that I went from doing nothing for four years to training my butt off for the past two. The rigour of everyday training has finally caught up with my relatively unconditioned body.
It’s not all bad, though. While I am of course envious of my would-be roommates taking advantage of the Cologne cuisine and attempting to put their newly acquired German vocabulary to good use, I have other equally, if not more, exciting things to attend to this week. Not only will I be getting an elbow in my groin for the 100th consecutive day, I’ll be going to the track to complete what will likely be my only session for the week: 5 x 50m (jogging pace). Talk about putting in the hard yards... and yes I know some of you are thinking “how’s this any different from Mitch’s normal session?” Well... I haven’t been able to find any glaring differences just yet, but I’ll get back to you.
Last year was a dream season for me and I’ll be the first to admit that I didn’t and still don’t fully appreciate the success I’ve had up until now. This injury has done an excellent job of letting me know that things don’t always come easy. There are a lot of things I could have been doing last year that I wasn’t. Actually, I should rephrase that; there were a lot of things my coach was telling me to do last year that I wasn’t. I’ve learnt the hard way but at the same time it’s nice to know I still have definite room for improvement in the future. I couldn’t call myself a proper athlete if I didn’t have at least one injury to talk about…
If truth be told a part of me is excited by the prospect of burying my head in those textbooks, watching the AFL grand final, and an array of other seemingly mundane activities that I get to indulge in now that I’m not travelling abroad. To those travelling to world juniors, I hope things turn out exactly as you plan. If they don’t (and not that this will be any consolation whatsoever) you might be interested to know that I didn’t go to world juniors or world youth. And to the Commonwealth Games athletes, I would wish you luck but I’m still hoping that I’ll be able to do that in person in a few months, so I’ll hold off for now…
