How Eastbourne Rovers athletes are adapting their training during the pandemic

By now the track and field athletes would have had league matches, the Sussex championships, some Southern area Championships as well as school events for the younger age groups. The Road runners would also have had the London Marathon as well as half marathons and other local road races.

However athletes are keeping motivated during lockdown doing strength workouts at home and varying running activities to fit in the local area.

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Shania Martlew would have been certain of bringing home medals in the sprints this season, so is keeping in touch with her speed by doing speed agility and quickness ladder drills in her garden. Jazhiah Williams ( T38 England sprinter) has also been working on strength exercises at Pevensey Wreck and Team manager Stuart Pelling is adding weight to his squats lifting his baby daughter!

Those taking their walk in Gildridge Park will have spotted the fastest 100m sprinter in Sussex as Bailey Wright practiced his block starts while the talented U 13 athlete, Dermot O’ Rourke has been running over the Downs to take in the sea views.

Masters British decathlon champion Brian Slaughter has found a 321 course to run on. England Athletics set routes all over England varying from 1km to 5km as part of the ‘Run in England’ drive.

Moyo Sargent (Bronze 400m at English schools) and Bryn Smith ( Silver 200m medalist at BUCS ) snapped up the chance to train with a friend and have been running ‘so close but so far away’ from the athletics track at Eastbourne Sports Park!

The younger athletes have had a 2km time trial and compared these performances to their Park Run 2k time. Oscar Mizen equalled his time and Katy Brown improved hers. They have been training in the local parks as well as treadmills and it has been a nice change from school work, keeping active and focussed.

Senior Road runners in the club have been running solo and more recently in pairs. During the last two weeks they have been logging their miles together to inspire each other to run and have so far ran over 1,600 miles in total.

The club has also been involved in some virtual relays. Rovers held their own relay which involved teams of 4 runners, completing a 3 mile run each as quickly as they could. In 3rd place was Sacha Stevens, Jen Whelan, Rob Young and Belinda Cramp with a total time of 1 hour 34 mins 31 secs. In second place was Alan Roberts, John Sanderson, Russell Aitkenhead and Liz Lumber ( ! hour 33mins28secs).The winners were Susan Drake, Mike Thompson, Natalie Hoadley and Emma Holder in a time of 1hour 30mins.40 secs.

The Rovers also took part in a inter club virtual relay organised by Hailsham Harriers on Sat 30th May. In the event each team had 30 runners, each with an allocated 30 min slot to run as far as they could in 30mins. Rovers had a fantastic two teams with team 2 finishing 4th with a total mileage of 113.2 miles and only a mile and a half behind were team 1 in 5th place.

The club continues to keep motivated hoping that competitions will resume before the end of the year and track athletes will be able to train on the lovely facilities at the Eastbourne Sports Park.