When it came time to planning a race season, and with a race referral up her sleeve, it was a no brainer for the coaches that Khadiga should return to the mystical Challenge Roth, where she had unfinished business from her previous attempt in 2019.
A couple of messages via the Sutto network (thank you Christine!) and Khadiga had a place to stay and set her mind on the challenge ahead.
Once locked in we looked at what sort of adjustments would be necessary to Khadiga's current training program in preparation for a full Iron distance event. As it turned out, not much! ‘She’s a stayer, a natural diesel’ was Brett’s advice.
So we kept Khadiga on a tried and tested training plan which can service all three distances, only really taking the distances up in the final five weeks. This included a lot of speed work in the run workouts, combined with, what I suspect Khadiga enjoys the most, the longer 800 and Zatopek sets!
Khadiga is a dedicated and hard working athlete and being a coach herself, she does a marvellous job at fitting in her own workouts around her coaching sessions. She gets on with it with minimal fuss and understands the importance of quick post workout feedback.
Race day
This was Khadiga's 6th Iron-distance event and isn't it a great feeling when everything falls into place! Knocking over an hour off her previous personal best Khadiga's words best describe her race day experience:
'I would like to say, that this is by far the best iron-distance race I have done, am not talking just time wise, but how I felt mentally throughout the race, the run especially, didn’t feel like walking or giving up like I saw a lot of athletes do towards the end or like I felt in the previous races. The training was very good, I learned how to deal with the physical pains and push through. Towards the end I felt that the faster and lighter my feet were the less pain I felt and I kept thinking of the 24x800/200 track session'
Congratulations Khadiga on an outstanding preparation and effort on the day.
Very proud coaches,
Susie and Brett