Friday, August 29, 2008 Cebu’s marathon queen returns to her domain
BACK on the tracks.
After her impressive finish in the 22nd Kota Kinabalu Climbathon, Leszl Gitaruelas does not even think of spending her prize money on a well-deserved vacation as goes back into the tracks to continue her training.
“I could not stop training. It has to be continuous. Otherwise, we get rusted,” said Gitaruelas, who is targeting more international races this year.
Hours after getting off the plane, Gitaruelas is back at the Cebu City Sports Center oval where she shifts her training from climbing mountains back to road running.
“Mountain running is very difficult compared to running on a flat road. But that doesn’t mean that it will be easier for me to get right back on the road because I would need to adjust my running again for it just as I had to get into another training for the mountain running,” Gitaruelas said.
“Cross training is hard because there are different sets of training we need to go through for a certain discipline. Road and mountain running target different kinds of muscles and require different kinds of intensity, technique and levels of endurance,” said Gitaruelas, who came up with the best finish by any Filipina runner in the 22-year-old climbathon last weekend.
The fitness expert finished fourth place to runners from France, Malaysia and Japan. It was a huge turnaround to her performance two years ago when severe muscle cramps forced her to reach the finish line on a stretcher. She bombed out of the race a kilometer away from the finish line. (MCB)
