Sally McLellan BLOG

Well having the title “world champion” before my name I think has a nice ring to it.

I really cant thank all the people who stayed up to watch me at the world championships. It truly feels like a huge honour KNowing i have so many supporters back home who really believe in me and appreciate what i do as an athlete.

I would love to take you all through my race but at the moment i am struggling to remember just what really happened when my memory comes back to me i will for sure take you through it…

At the moment i am in Zurich preparing to race tonight. It feels quite strange for me to be racing again after being on such a hight but being the competitor that i am i will again go out there to try and win. I am not promising any fantastic times tonight but what i am promising is that i am going to give it everything i can to produce the best result.

The rest of the season i am really going to try and enjoy it and just be relaxed knowing i have done what i wanted to do already and that is winning the world title.

I will try my best to write another blog after i race and let you all know how i went.

talk to you soon
sally

The world championships has kicked off in fine form with our world champion discus thrower Dani Samuels Going through to the final which will be held tonight. My room mate Alana Boyd is up today in the women’s Pole vault qualification. I am so excited for these two girls as they are both my flat mates and it is very exciting to see them do well and get great results.
It is now only 5 days till i run. I feel like i have been waiting a lifetime for this comp to start and now that it is here it felt like it snuck up on me. I have a rest day from training today but i unfortunately wont be heading out to watch at the track as i feel that it is better to rest my body and my mind on preparation for my hurdles.

There isn’t much else to report on except that i am very ready to run and cant wait to get out there.

talk to you soon
sal

I am so sorry for not updating everyone after my race in monaco or even my race in the London Diamond league.

It has been a whirl wind of a season for me and I could ask for anything better.
Monaco went great. It is my favourite place to visit because of the weather and the amazing expensive places to see and do hahah not that i can really do any of it but it is nice to dream….
I wasn’t overly happy with my race in Monaco, although i did win and I am more than grateful for that, I wasn’t happy with how I raced it, It was very messy to my standards. I crossed the line 1st and saw 12.51 and this time I really couldn’t believe the time. I thought it would be a lot slower considering what i just said about it.
The Monaco meet put on a dinner and show for us every year and this year was no different. The Prince of monaco also always show up and supports the meet and also come and joins us at the dinner. To my surprise when i was sitting down to eat an organiser of the competition came up to me and said “come with me the prince would like you to join him at his table for dinner”.. in my total disbelief and shock i said “don’t be silly i know your having me on” and he said “your right he doesn’t” and i as i sat back down he “No i am not joking come now” so i stood up and walked over to the prices table.
Standing patiently behind him as he finished his conversation he turned around and said “hi, nice to meet you” and shook my hand.. I couldn’t believe that i was shaking the princes of Monaco’s hand haha it was the most unbelievable thing that had happened to me. I sat down at the table and everyone waited for the prince to start before we all started eating unlike this african runner who was also invited to sit at his table. It was so funny this athlete came over and sat down and was served his dinner and picked up his knife and fork and began to eat clearly unaware that no one else had started yet let alone the prince!!!!! Another surprise for me was that i was awarded athlete of the meet and awarded up on stage by the prince.

The night was coming to an end after a few glasses of wine and a fantastic tribute show to Michael jackson it was time for bed.

The London Diamond league was up next and this was the race i was very excited about. The programming I believe wasn’t the best. The heats were on at 13.24pm and then the final was on at 16.06pm so about 2 hours 40mins apart which never happens at a competition. There never usually is that much time in between heat and final, but all the same i didn’t want to get frustrated about it and I just had to “deal”. My heat run was once again very good i won it in a time of 12.55 and i felt really good i was so relaxed and ran very smoothly. Now came the waiting game. My coach and i were in new territory here we didn’t know how my body was going to react which such a long time period in between. I had to do a full warm up again and get my body pumped up to race. I was feeling great and really ready to run. I crossed the finish line first with a time of 12.58, I was a little disappointed with the time as i knew i had a lot left in the tank. Sharon and I put it down to the time in between we both thought that i had another 12.4 time in me so we were both taken aback when we saw 12.58. We both know that i am more than capable of running a lot faster by the time the worlds come around and that is what i am excited about.

The season has now finished until after the world championships and i couldn’t be happier, Knowing that i am undefeated going to Korea and doing everything possible to be in the best shape by the time the final comes around.

After London i went and spent a night at my aunties house down in Kent who put on a family BBQ the next day for me. I had a fantastic time catching up with everyone and was very excited to see my young cousin who i hadn’t seen for a year. She is only 18 months old and the changes that happen in that time are huge. I was glad to see she is very energetic and very loud… reminds me of someone.

AFter my very short stay at my aunties we travelled to The Tonbridge School which is a boys boarding school to check out and try the facilities there. This place is where we will be staying before we head into the athletes village for the Olympics.
It was an amazing school with so much to offer and all the staff there was so accommodating and absolutely bent over backwards to serve us. I could be more impressed with how everything was organised there.

Now at present time i am in the athletes village in Daegu, Korea. After a long journey here i can safely say that i am very happy. Usually at the world championships they pile all the athletes into a few hotels which i would never complain about but here in Korea they have set up an athletes village like they do at an olympics or a commonwealth games. There are about 6 or 7 high rise apartment that have 4 bedroom a kitchen and a lounge room they are very modern and very beautiful. the athlete liaison officers here work round the clock to keep us happy. The have done a remarkable job looking after us and i have only been here less than 24 hours!!!! I have only had about 4.5 hours sleep due to jet lag so it is only 530am when i am writing this i started at 4.30am. No much more to report on in the village i will update when i have an explore around.

talk to you soon
sally

Well I am sitting here in cologne writing this blog after my second diamond league of the season.

I went to Birmingham, England on the 9th july in really good shape, although, I did leave a very big week of training behind me and to me a not so good hurdles session on the the july, I did however feel in really good shape and ready to run fast. I went into the competition very relaxed from the words of my husband. I said to him I may seem to be relaxed but on the inside I am going crazy. I guess I have learnt to hide my feelings when I am “on the job”.
Race day comes and yet I do tend to feel rather relaxed and just “comfortable” when I tend to feel like this is when I know I have something special to do.
I ran the heat in a season best and also a stadium record of 12.57. I was very happy about that but didn’t want to get to excited or waste to much energy knowing that I still had the final to come and wanted to produce a better result. I warmed up a little different for the final to how I usually warm up, Because I had just run really well in the heat I knew that my body had just worked very hard, so, my coach wanted to make sure that I didn’t do too much to tire it out for the final. I didn’t do any block starts at all all I did was run throughs over the hurdles. Doing block start can really fatigue your neural system. We wanted to make sure that I was going to be as fresh as I could be going into the final.
It was time to head out to my race. The crowed was noisy. The stadium had so much atmosphere in it I felt like I was already at the world championships. We went into our blocks on the starters request and then one of the other athletes put her hand up and I think i over heard her saying to the official about the noise and being held for too long. I tried my hardest to allow the atmosphere and the noise of the stadium to help me get through the race. I believe if you cant beat it join it. So, what I didn’t was try and draw the crowed into me and use their energy for a fast race. we were finally off and I was racing out of my skin I could believe how fast I was running, I still had Danielle Curruthers on my tail and I couldn’t seem to shake her. I wanted to make sure I was in good shape by the sixth hurdles and make sure I was in front. I knew if I was in front by the sixth hurdle that I was going to win the race. I got to the sixth hurdle perfectly in front, all I had to do now was stay focused and grit my teeth all the way to the finish line. I crossed the line and saw 12.48. In my head I could believe it. I knew I was in that shape I knew I could win that race and I just broke my australian record by 2 hundredths of a second. I didn’t get overly excited for some reason, I just felt at ease. I didn’t jump around or get to emotional I just smiled.

I think when we get to this stage of our careers that when you tick something off your list you don’t have to show boat around, you can keep it to yourself and give yourself a pat on the back for doing something great. Until you reach your ultimate goal, which for me is winning the world championships.

WEll that is it for now. My next race is in Monaco on the 22nd of June.
talk to you after that.

Sal

Well it has been a week since I left Australia. I have had my first race and have done very well.

It was probably one of the best races that I have ever run. I ended coming first with a time of 12.47 unfortunately the wind was illegal +3.3 (a legal wind is +2.0). I knew I was in good shape going into the race but I seemed to be aware of everything going on around me, which sometime I believe that means your not entirely focused on what your doing, in my case it didn’t seem to be that way. I didn’t seem to get out of the blocks with my signature start but it was still strong enough to be in front of everyone else. My best part of the race didn’t come till the last 4 hurdles where I seemed to be at my strongest. I have been working on this last part of my race for a while now. I was always strongest over the first 6 and then the other girls seem to catch up on me, in this race I seemed to get stronger throughout the race.

I am now in my second home of Koeln, Germany. I will base here for the whole european season while flying to my 2nd and 3rd races in Birmingham and Monaco while finishing here on the 6th when I fly to my last race in London before heading to Korea for the world championships.

talk to you soon,

Sal x

Well I am here in Lausanne, Switzerland… What more can i say…

Switzerland is one of the most beautiful countries on the world, and one of my favourite places to visit. I am sitting here writing this after my first night off the plane from Australia. It is still 430am and i am wide awake. Unfortunately after a failed attempt to try and stay awake till at least 8pm last night I am now suffering the consequences. Last night i was trying with all my might to stay awake for as late as possible but could only muster up till 530pm haha, I know terrible attempt but to my defence i don’t even remember falling asleep, I woke up 4 hours later and couldn’t believe that I had fallen asleep.

On today agenda I will be heading to the track to attempt to do a training session.. we will see how the legs manage it before that i will be doing a “Home gym session” that my strength couch Peter Hannan made up for me. We call it this because i have discovered that sometimes when i fly around europe i don’t always get to a gym or there isn’t one available, so, Peter made up a gym session for me that didn’t require me to be in a proper gym. I can do it all in the comfort of my Hotel room hence the name hotel room gym.

My competition is on thursday night. for those of you down under it is on early friday morning. if you would like to catch it live on eurosport you can get up very early in the morning and watch it or they do tend to play quite a few replays the next day.

till next time everyone…

sally

HI Everyone,

well since i last spoke to you i was talking about what has happened after nationals and that we qualified for the world champs in the relay.
Since then i have been training really hard and also really well. I have started competing locally at my club the gold coast victory club. On the 6th june i raced in my first 400 since the commonwealth games. I raced really well and did a personal best of 53.86. i was really excited because i didn’t get tired at the spot that i usually do, so i was able to race through to the finish line in quite good shape. Two weeks later which was on the 18th 19th june i races in the 100m and the 100m hurdles. I was really nervous to race in my first hurdles race since nationals. I came out of the blocks a bit slow but oicked up my pace and ended up running a very fast time of 12.74 which is equal to the fastest time on australian soil originally ran by me as well. next was the 100m. I new i was in good shape and i was ready to run fast. There was a false start unfortunately and that really put me off so my next start wasn’t the best but i still got up and going and ended up running 11.35 which is a faster time that i ran to win the national championships.

At the moment i am racing again this weekend on saturday in the 100m and the 60m. i was down to run the hurdles but that is still a question mark at the moment. I haven’t told you guys either that i am going to europe on sunday. I have been counting down for about 8 weeks now, so, it feels like it has taken for ever> i am now down to 4.5 days till i leave with my husband flying into Zurich for my first race in Lausanne, Switzerland.

I will do my best to get result up after i race on the weekend.

talk to you soon
sal

Well it has been a long time since i last blogged to everyone.

Since my last blog i have been to japan to race in the relay to try and help us qualify for the world championships, We had to run a time of 44.00 seconds. We all got together on the gold coast on the 4th May for some training before we flew out to race. The training session went really well and we all got the baton in. It had a different feel to these training sessions as it to the session before we raced in sydney to try and qualify, we just seemed to click and everything was going really well for us. The day before the comp in Japan we had a small training session but only the third runner to last runner were doing changes as the last runner was not available for the gold coast training. The day of the competition we were all really excited and ready to run we couldnt wait to be competing against a good team like Japan we knew they were fast and hoping for them to pull us through for a qualifyer.

At the end of the race we all got together we knew we had done well we all knew that our changes went well and we got the baton around safely, all we had to know now was the time. It took a while for the time to come up as Japan had just run a national record so all the media was swarming them to interview them so we had to wait for the interviews to be over before we knew. Once they were over we were just waiting in anticipation which felt like an eternity but only turned out to be like 3 minutes. the results were up Australia second in a time on 43.69, AT that same minute we all jumped around screaming with excitment. ALl the hard work was over we had done it we qualified for the world champs and we are all going to Daegu, Korea.

Since Japan i have been in some very heavy training to get ready for me to fly to Europe and start my own campaign to the wrold champs for the hurdles.
It has been tough the training is really hard but I am manging it. With all the Hard work i did before the Australian season started it helped for me to be able to handle the workload i am doing now.

I leave in exactly 5 week today heading straight into Zurich, Switzerland to start off my campaign at the Lausanne Diamond League. I am very excited and look forward to letting you all know how i go.

till then have fun.

sal

Finally the season is over. I don’t want that to sound that i hated the season or the season was a disaster but i have raced 23 races since January and am exhausted.

Nationals went really well, better than i expected it to go. I won my three events that i entered for in not to bad times.

My schedule:

Friday Night: 530pm- 100m heats
Saturday night: 7.35pm-100m semi finals, 9.00pm 100m finals
Sunday afternoon: 12.40pm – 200m heats, 2.15pm 100m hurdles heats, 3.10pm- 200m finals, 3.50pm – 100m hurdles final

that was my weekend for the national champs. Pretty hectic but I managed. I races really well like i said before. My time for the 100m was 11.38, 200m 23.20 and 12.83 for the 100m hurdles. My plan was to go to melbourne and aim for “melbourne pb’s” the reason for this was because melbourne doesnt usually have the best of weather, So the pessimist in me said well I am not going to do very good results so why I dont I just the fasted I can in melbourne weather? I Did and melbourne actually put on great weather for us and I didnt end up doing to badly. It was a massive struggle to get through the three events my body was very tired but at the end of the day I had an amazing time doing the challange. Even better news I ended up winning the female athlete of the year for athletics so it was a huge honour to win that award after an amazing Australian season.

next up for me is the meet in Japan. Our relay team is going to japan to try and qualify for the world championahips. Right now I am on a 9 day break and I will be going into the Japan meet with only 10 days of training. Some people would say that is crazy but I trust in my coach and also I have just come off 7 months of good training and competition so I also have faith in my ability to help pull the relay through with a qualifyer.

talk to you guys soon.

sally