Sally McLellan BLOG

Well i am so sorry for this late post. I didnt want to write one until i was home and everything had calmed right down so that i could reflect on everything that had happen for me while i was away.

When i arrived back on australian soil i had been away for 3 months exactly. In that time i had visited 8 countries. France was the first stop with a third place in monaco. Then off to cologne where i based for training and living. Then it was off to stockholme with a win there. Luzern was straight after that with my second win there after that england with a second placing there. I then went back to cologne for a two week stint for training I then flew off to belgium with another second placing there. After finishing that i came back to cologne for another two week stint for training before i flew off to croatia for the world continental cup coming home with a win and my first senior title of my career. We then headed to delhi for the commonwelath games. I had so much fun there and i will never forget it.

The commonwealth games were absolutley amazing for me with a rollercoaster of emotion. I would not change a thing about the games. I had so much fun there competing and hanging out with some athletes that have later on become very special friends to me that will be there forever.

I am now back home and had my first press conference that aired on channel 10, 9, fox sports, ABC and 7 there were also a few local journos there to interview me as well. I started back at training yesterday doing a session of plyos which is bounding and jumping, I had an absolute ball but today is very unforgiving with me not really being able to walk because of sore quads.

I would like to thank all of my supporters and fans that helped me get through this season all of your messages on this site have been amazing and i really appreciate it. For my sponsers AXA, Adidas and Mitsubishi. Thank you for still believing in me and with out you i would not be able to put 100% into my sport and get the results i know i can achieve.

The next two years are going to be huge for me, probabaly the biggest two years of my athletic career. The world championships are next year to be held in Korea. My goal is to come out on top again and win. I am so excited about getting stuck into training and putting all my focus on this championships to bring home gold. I know that i can do it and i have a really good belief in my self going into this season and i know that i can achieve my goal.

until next time

Well here i am again, sitting around trying to sit still to rest my body and all i can think of is going for a run. i guess that is what you get for being and energetic sprinter.

I race very soon in the athletics part of the games which is good becasue i dont know what i would do if i had to wait a long time.

The village has definitely filled up with a lot of amazing athletes and watching them train is amazing. The one thing i love about multi spor games isthat you get to see different athletes from all around the world train and prepare for what is one of the biggest sporting events in the world!!

anyway the opening ceremony i on tonight but i have chosen not to walk in it as i really have to rest my body. There are a few athletes staying back and we have decided to have our own opeing ceremony. we are going to get dresses up and get our flag and walk into the room and sit down and watch it on the TV haha, i am really looking forward to.

anyway must be off tlak to you soon. and remember keep watching i have a suprise.

Hello everyone,

i am now all settled into my new home at the commonwealth games in Delhi. we arrived here on the 30th of september at about midnight and didnt arrive in the village till 130am. My first impressions of the village was we need to do some tidying up, so the next day we asked for some mops and some sponges and used detol to go over everything to make it shine and feel like we are at home. We finally woke at 9am with a bash on the door, which was not very nice, for a 930am team meeting. staright away after that i was taken to a press conference at 1030am to discuss how my preparations are going, soon after we arrived it was all talk about the cyclist from spain who has won the last two tour de france races about he tested positive in a drug test. With that all up in the air the press conference was quite easy seeing as though they werent interested until the end to find out how i was doing, But the is the press for you.

I am have now done two training session one on the track and today in the gym. I am feeling good and ready to race. I met up with two of my training partners andrea miller from new zealand and Francis from PNG. It was really nice to see them as i have not seen them since i left for europe on the 19th July.

The village itself is fine for our length of stay, there still needs to have a few mantenance stuff done but nothing to serious that is going to be dangerous or un safe. I am just plotting along at the moment trying to fill my day so i dont just sit around doing nothing and just trying to stay focused and sty away from the deserts that are on offer until the end of my competition.

Anyway i must be off and ill leave you with this, there is going to be a suprise at the games from me, so stay tuned.

sally.

Sorry it has been a long time since i have written.
I left off telling you that i was about to leave for the finnal leg of the diamond league in Brussels. It was a very cold night at race time it iwas about 16 degrees. I was feeling pretty good about racing. I didnt get out of the blocks how i would have liked and again my blocks slipped which is not ideal. I ended up with 2nd place again which was quite annoying because i thought i could’ve won that race. Since Brussels i had another 2 week wait till the continental cup in Split. This was the race that i wanted to win the most it was one of my main goals this year and i wanted it so bad. I didnt feel that great in the warm up even though i had my coach was there willing me that i was looking amazing. I went into the race confident that i could win. the gun went off then the second gun fired for us to come back to the start line. There was no false start just an annoying unsteady start. The reason for it being annoying is that i had the best sart the first time and was well ahead of the rest of the girls and would’ve stayd there. The next start and we were off. I didn’t have the best of start and wasnt hurling the best through out the race. Lolo jones myslef and perdita felicien were very close to eachother coming up to the finish line, i dipped so far forward that i almost ended up falling over. It took about 1 minute for the result to come up. Sally pearson 1st time of 12.65 stadium record, lolo jnes jones second 12.66. i was so excited and so relieved that i achieved my first goal for the season and i now have my first championship.

I am now in Gateshead about to run in the Australia Vs England Street race on upon Tyne right next to the water. It is going to be fantastic. I am running in the 100m hurdles and the 150m. There are only four people who take place in the race two from Australia and two from England and only first place gets a point for their coountry. The hurdles is one of the first events on the track then 45minutes later it will be the 150m race. It is quite scary because it s in a straight line so it looks like a 100m but a bit longer. Lat year took the victory in a humiliating score of 10-1 This year it will be different we have a stronger team and it is going to be very close it may very well come down to the last event which is the mens 110 hurdles which if we are ied going into the event England should win but i am going to try and win both my events and if i can do that it will be hard for us to lose.

It is my birthday tomorrow and i am 24 years old. My only request is that i go out to dinner to an italian restaurant so i can have my favouite meal Spaghetti woohoo.

anyway i wont leave it to long for my next entry.

see ya,
sal.

Well here i am again in my base camp waiting till thursday when i am travelling off to brussels to run in the next leg of the diamond league.

I have had a very good season this year. i have won 2 our of the 4 competitions that i have competed in and the other two i have place 2nd and 3rd,not bad for someone who is coming back from a back injury that ruled me out of the second half of my season last year.

It has been two weeks since i raced in London. The weather was terrible there it as raining so hard about an hour before i had to run and the rain came streaming into the indoor facility where everyone was warming up, it was an amazing sight. The rain stopped just before it was time for my race thank goodness. There were heat and finals for my event so i was really looking forward to another good hit out. I raced well in heat to win in a time of 12.66 and came 2nd in the final in a time of 12.61. I was really happy that i was able to back up for 8 days with 5 races and still produce quality times like that. somehting that i would not have been able to do last year.

Now it is onto the final of leg of the diamond leage competitions and i very much looking forward to it. I am feeling fit and fast and ready to race.

talk to you after the race
sal.

Well i think that i have had a very good weekend at the office. i achieved goals that werent set until the end of the season with times under 12.6 seconds which is world class hurdling. my first race was in stockholm, there were two heats then the final at 9.19pm. i was in heat 2 in lane 2. I didnt get out of the blocks that well which is usually my strongest part of my race. I then had to play catch up to put myself in a good position to make the final which was top 3 then next two fastest times made it through. I didnt want to get the two fastest times, i wanted to make it through in top 3. i made it, third with a new season best of 12.70. Time for the final i drew lane seven which was the lane i drew last year in the final and came fourth with 12.64. i was very ready to run and very excited to be there. I wasnt sure on where or what time i was going to run all i knew was that i was ready. i walked out into the stadium to a roaring crowd, the sun shining and i was ready. i put my game face on and i focused on getting that start perfect. i came out of the blocks first and lead all the way to the finish line and with a time of 12.57. i couldnt believe it i wasnt shocked about the win becasue i knew that i could achieve that, i was more shocked about how fast it was. I havent run that quickly for over a year since my back problems.

i was then due to fly out to switzerland the next day to race on the sunday in one of my favourite place in the world. my body was very sore and tired from racing in stockholm but i was determined to race and run well becasue i knew i had physio on monday when i got back to my base in cologne. i warmed up and felt quite tight but as i kept pushing thrugh my warm up my body was feeling better. Time to race. i had no idea what to expect in this race i just wanted to win. i crossed the finish line in another time under 12.6 of 12.59. i was more shocked with that time having backed up 48 hours after stockholme i was thrilled and so was my coach.

i am now back in cologne doing a little training before i head to run in london at crystal palace. I won here last year and am hoping i can repeat the feat.

anyway must be off have to refuel my body with some lunch.

Hi Everyone,

Well its almost time again to take off my sweats and put on the spikes to get ready to run fast. I leave for stockholm on thursday afternoon and race friday night. I am feeling very ready to race this time. My body is in really good shape and i am feeing so quick.
My trainig is going really well. It was nice to have two weeks after monaco to get settled in and do some quality training.
It has now been two weeks since i have been away and for the whole time the weather has been horribly cold and raining almost everyday. The faciltity that i am training at has an indoor track and i am so lucky to be able to train on it, although, there is not much air in there and i am feeling myself getting light headed some times.
Anyway ill be able to talk more after my race, so until next time.
sal.

wll i have been over here for exactly a week now and it has flown by. I race in monaco on the 22nd july and raced really well i got third in a time of 12.76. I am really happy with how i raced and all i need to do now is get race fitness and the girls will never catch me. I came out of the blocks first with the fastest reaction time and stayed in front for most of the race it wasnt until about hurdles 6 when they came over the top of me, so that is why i am very happy with my first race back on the scene.

i am now at my base in cologne. The day befoe we arrived the sun was out and the temperature was about 36 degrees the day after when we arrived the clouds came over and the temperature dropped to about 19 degrees and has remained that way since the 23rd, talk about coming over here for the warm weather!!!! anyway i am still having a great time and training is going very well.

anyway bet be off have to go to trainning.

P.s i am trying to put photos up butdes not seem to be working at the moment, i will do my best and keep trying.

talm to you soon.

Well it is that time again when i have to pack my bags and head to the glorious world of international athletics.
My first stop is a place where the rich and famous anchor their million dollar boats and cruise the streets in nothing less than a ferrari. This place i call Monte Carlo. I have been to this place twice before and have broken my australian record also twice.

I have decided to come into this season with a different mental attitude. Now it may seem like this attitude would be easy to come by, but you would be wrong, for an athlete this attitude will have been lost when they have a sniff of succes and realise they want more and more. This attitude that seems hard to come by is called “fun”. I raced on the weekend at a little local club and i decided to practice this new thought process, i ended running a new personal best in the 60m and racing really well in my other events. I havent felt that good since i last raced at a high level competition since the world championships. I spoke to my coach and we both believe that this thought process will be one of my main focuses when i leave for europe tomorrow.

I have also been doing some Promotional events such as going to the titans vs broncos game, i also went to country victoria in gippsland to launch the new Pro race in woodside.  I am the ambassador for this event that will be held on the 18th of december and i will be racing.

anyway I’d  better get back to packing and getting myself ready for tomorrow.

have fun and the next time i will be talking to you will be in monaco.

sally

Well i had my first race last week, it didnt go all that bad even though i didnt place well, the time i ran wasnt that bad.
Here is what went wrong that didnt help my positioning at the competition.
Everything was going well until i actually got to New York. The Night i got there that is when it all started to go bad.

10.30pm i went to sleep on Wednesday night
4.30am Thursday Morning woke up, got up out of bed about 7.30am and went the Gym
9.30am went for a walk around central park then down 5th avenue,
1.30pm went to training,
7pm Had a Nap
8pm woke up and felt worse so decided to go back to sleep, slept quite well until…
330am Friday morning i woke up,
7.15am, got up out of bed had some breakfast, went for a walk around time square
11AM had a 4hour nap thought it would be a good idea then i could go to bed late that night and have a good night sleep, how wrong was I….
3pm woke up was wide awake.
10pm started to get tired. Fell asleep. Woke up an hour later and stayed awake all night
8am Friday morning, got up had some breakfast
9am went back to bed. Slept for 3 hours
12pm got up had a shower
1.30pm caught the bus to go to the track to get ready for my competition.

So that was my trip that i did not have planned. As you can see there was not much sleep happening but a lot of awake time staring st the ceiling in the bedroom.

Considering all this i ran 12.83, placed 8th unfortuantley. I did have the best reaction time out of the blocks than any of the other girls in the race but my blocks slipped so i could not use the power that i had penetrated off the blocks.

while all of this did happen to me i still love New York it is on of my favorite place and i still had a blast and took some photos for you all to see.

I head to Europe in a month and i am sure that i will not have a problem like this again.

till next time
sal