Thrilling Times!

On Tuesday my place in the British Team for the European Championships in Zurich was confirmed! Yay!

I will be the only British walker competing at the championships, but am currently training at altitude with the other GB Endurance athletes in Font-Romeu in preparation.

This will be my first European Athletics Championships and my second race for GB this season. I’m really looking forward to racing at a major championships which will be awesome prep for next years World champs and Rio Olympics in 2016!

I was confident of my selection for Zurich after getting the qualifying time (1:23:30) for the 20k twice this year. I hope to better my 1:22:20 from April in Zurich, or if the conditions are tough to put in a performance of that scale!

I also won the Trials for the Europeans in York in June which confirmed my place then and there. This one really means a lot to me.

After missing out on the London Olympics by 19 seconds in 2012 and being unsuccessful in selection for Moscow World Champs last year with only 3 ‘B’ standards, I was over the moon to get this year’s qualifying time done and dusted. It will also be counted toward next year’s World Championships in Beijing, so it was a meaningful progression forward.

In 2010, Johanna Atkinson (nee Jackson), current Commonwealth Games gold medalist gave me a few good words of advice. ‘Keep plugging away at those qualifying times, because as soon as you walk it, you will keep doing it’. It turns out she wasn’t wrong, but it didn’t feel like that back then!!

And so this season could not have been better so far. My new PB puts me 3rd on the British All-time list, I’m the first British man to ever walk under 1:23:00 more than once in a season, as well as reclaiming my 5k British record. But there is still space for one more big performance to top off 2014, and set me up nicely for 2015.

Training is entering its final stage of the season with only 4 weeks until race day.

Some strong miles here at altitude will set me up and that’s exactly what’s been happening. Training in such beautiful environments with the GB team has made it much easier and even enjoyable! I’m even getting a tan!

Great food, great coffee and great training! I even took a selfie after training it was that awesome!

Now I can’t wait to race in Zurich and make everyone who has supported me in Leeds and Kent over the years proud. My plan to make race walking big in the UK is still intact and stronger than ever!!

From a sunny mountain I sign off for now. #TomWalksFast