Over Easter, Mulan had a trip down to Palmerston North for the athletics New Zealand interprovincial (IP) competition.
It was something of a relief that this finally happened, as last year's competition was cancelled because of Covid. For the past few weeks we were counting down the days to IP, checking the news that there were no community Covid cases! (Thanks team-of-five-million for keeping us all collectively safe and free!)
Mulan was selected into the Auckland team, in the 13 girls grade. Huge WELL DONE!!!! And congrats to all those selected in all the teams -- it is a great achievement, and there are some amazing athletes. Getting to compete against the best in the country is always something special.
The IP is a team competition, where the focus is on each athlete gaining points to add to their province's team score. Team support, including team chants and friendships, are a big part of the weekend.
Us family didn't go; Mulan went with the team. While it was sad to miss seeing her compete, it was better for her to have a time without us.
It was an early start Friday morning, dropping her off at the team bus at Mt Smart Stadium at 7 in the morning. And then we picked her up again Monday evening.
In between, the athletes competed both Saturday and Sunday, and had a dance/party until midnight on Sunday.
For her final competition of the season, Mulan had awesome performances - two PBs plus another couple of solid results.
First up on Saturday, Mulan ran the 400m. Throughout the season, Mulan had almost never done any specific running training (no time, with all her other activities).
But two weeks out from the competition we decided to do a bit. She'd run a new PB of 1:11.06 at the Auckland Champs two weeks before the IPs. It was a great run, but her legs struggled for the final 50m. We needed a quick bit of strengthening up.
So, most days for that two-week period, Mulan and I biked to the track and ran 300m reps. It was quick and simple, tucked into our busy day. We both ran together, doing two (and then three) reps of 300m at around 55 seconds with 4 minutes recovery between.
The result was that at the IPs Mulan ran 1:09.17! Two seconds is an incredible improvement in such a short time. The training worked, and good on Mulan! Mulan said her legs felt so much stronger in the final straight.
Given this, the two of us plan to do some winter running training. Likely, once a week we'll do things like uphill/stairs reps of 40 or 50 seconds. See if we can both get stronger and increase the number of reps we can do before our legs get too wobbly.
Next, Mulan did the shot put. She had a solid throw of 7.66m (her PB is 8.03m).
Mulan's final Saturday event was her favourite, the long jump. Again, she had a solid result, with 4.27m (her PB is 4.54m).
On Sunday, Mulan did her final individual event, the discus. Similar to the 400m, we'd done a bit of training work on this in the several days leading up to the competition.
In particular, we'd worked on getting her foot placement more regular, so that her throws were more consistently in, and she could have confidence to push hard knowing that at least one of her throws should work.
Again, the training paid off. Mulan improved two metres, with a huge new PB of 22.37m.
Finally, Mulan finished off with running 100m in the 13 girls medley relay (where five runners do 100m, 100m, 200m, 400m, 800m). The Auckland team came second, behind Canterbury.
Saturday's results are here, and Sunday's results are here. Plenty of names to look out for in New Zealand sport in the next several years.
That evening, at the IP prizegiving the Auckland team was announced as second overall (behind Canterbury). Mulan got a well-deserved silver medal.
And with that our athletics season is over.
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