For me, the word "perfection" probably isn't the right word. Saying that I'm perfecting something makes it sound like what I'm doing is almost perfect, and that couldn't be further from the truth. Improving might be a better word, but since I'm sticking with the TDR slogan, "Passion, Perfection, Performance," this blog is still the perfection blog.
These are the things I've been perfecting this year, or some of them... everything needs perfection. And I have been perfecting everything. Even the things I'm still horrible at are much better than they were at the beginning of the year, and after Portugal they're better than they were before Portugal.
Farthest from Perfect:
- Jumping high. I've never been able to jump high, but it doesn't help that I'm afraid to try to jump high. I'm still the only one who has to jump next to the hurdles we're jumping over, and in front of the box we're supposed to jump on to.
- Sprinting. The joke that I'm going to be made into a sprinter never gets old.
- High knees. Whenever the sprint coach sees me run by he tells me to bring my knees up. At least to a 90 degree angle he says. And the whole time it felt like they were already at a 120 degree angle...
- Toes to my nose. There's this jumping exercise we do where we have to jump as high as we can using only the flexing movement of our toes. The thing is, every time we do this I automatically have to pee. Which makes it really hard to jump higher and higher. I'm going to blame the huge distance between my toes and my nose on my small bladder.
- Leaping. "Loopsprong" is what you say in Dutch. The other runners look so strong and fast when they do it, but it still hasn't really clicked for me.
- Elbows in. The more tired I get the further my elbows get from my body. It's a sad story.
- Underwater swimming. Don't even get me started.
Really Far From Perfect:
- 800m dash. The word "dash" says it all. The thing is, people who are really "dashers," like the athletes who run 100m and 200m dont' really like dashing for 800m. So people like me who don't think 800m is all that far have to try to run fast, and then 800m does seem far.
- Hill sprints. Hill sprints only get to be under the second worst category because they're better than my normal sprints. Sometimes I can get on my toes, sometimes I can get my knees up, and sometimes I can push through to the end.
- 80 second laps in an interval training. It's happened before- around 80 seconds, and it's way better than 90 second laps in an interval training.
- "Zweef Momenten." A zweef moment is when neither of your feet is touching the ground. There were a few flying moments in Portugal, and now I want more.
Still Pretty Far From Perfect:
- Skipping. If I focus really hard and think "tic, tic, tic" in my head, remember to keep my hips high, my feet quick, my head forward, my knees straight, then it works. Sometimes and for a few seconds.
- Mental strength. I don't give up right away anymore when I hear an impossible workout. Instead, I try to pretend it's not that impossible, and focus on the series: one at a time. Before you know it we're done- whether we ran the right times or not.
- Eating. If we look at every time I don't eat dessert, and every time I eat an apple instead of a cookie, or close the cupboard door when I see a bar of chocolate, then I'm doing pretty well. We'll keep it that way- focusing on what I AM passing up, and not what I'm not passing up.
- Drinking water. I'm a drinking professional. I can drink glass, after glass, after glass- as long as there's a bathroom somewhere in the area.
- Long runs by myself. If I feel good and the weather's nice, sometimes 45 minutes fly by and I can finish fast.
- Actually, long runs in general. If I don't have to go speed up, I can go for a long time.
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