Fionnuala Britton has said her passion for winning the GloHealth Inter-County Cross Country Championships remains undimmed and spoken about her desire to balance cross-country with marathon running.
Britton will start as the favourite for the senior womens race at Dundalk IT next Saturday. Looking ahead to the race, the two-time winner said that she was looking to go better than last year’s fourth spot.
“Having won it twice, it doesn’t make you not want to go back and win it again. It makes you almost want to win it more. After coming fourth last year, I’d like to improve on that again. It is like a clean slate every time.”
"When you don’t have things to compare to ... I think it’s a little bit easier to believe"
The race will be an important part of the selection process for the team selections for the European Cross Country championships, which take place in Bulgaria in December.
Britton said that the championships were on her mind, but she was also looking ahead to next year, when she is considering running another marathon to try to secure qualification for the Rio Olympics in 2016.
In August this year, Britton finished a creditable 10th in her first marathon at the European championships in Zurich. She said that the result was not what she had hoped for, but that she was keen to continue her development in the marathon.
“I was glad that I did it and, it wasn’t terrible [even if] it wasn’t as good as I wanted,” she said. “I do want to do it again; it’s not like it put me off.”
Since Zurich, Britton has just run a couple of cross country events and also took victory in the Remembrance Run 5K in Dublin’s Phoenix Park. She enjoyed the chance to vary her routine ahead of the cross country season.
“I liked it this year because it was different. When you do the same thing all the time it’s not to compare and not to expect certain things.
"So, getting to run the 8k at the Gerry Farnan – or the Autumn Open, or whatever – and in a mixed race just meant that it was a hard race but it wasn’t something that I could compare, which is good.
“And then I ran in the Laois county senior ... partly because the races in Europe didn’t match up to when to the races at home were. The Burgos [in Spain] is usually on earlier and [this year] it was on the week before the Nationals, so it doesn’t fit in really well.
“There was a gap there where I didn’t have races, so it was nice to get another mixed race in, to get a hard race but not have to travel for it.”
The Dublin runner said this approach to her schedule was a positive because it prevented her comparing year on year, and forced her to simply believe in herself.
“It’s better to just be able to put the work in. You have to just believe in yourself, where sometimes you’ll have doubts when you can compare what you did before to what you done this year. Every year is not going to be the same, every build-up is not going to be the same. When you don’t have things to compare to ... I think it’s a little bit easier to believe.”
Britton's focus for the rest of this year will be cross-country, although she will decide in 2015 whether to switch her attention to marathon.
“You’re obviously doing your endurance training for cross-country anyway, so it’s not as if you’ve suddenly stopped, and you’re launching into marathon training three or four months later.
"You wouldn’t be doing specific marathon training until the New Year anyway.
“It’s a case of whether to decide whether to stick with cross-country, and focus on world cross [the World Championships are in Guiyang, China, in March of next year] or take a step back and focus on a marathon. I really haven’t actually decided that.
“In one way, I’d love to do world cross again, because I feel like I have unfinished business with world cross. And yet, it’s in China: I suppose it means it’s a very big focus, because you can’t really mix it with anything else, because there’s a lot of travel, recovery, and all that kind of stuff associated with it.
“I think they’re big decisions I have to make but I don’t really think I need to make them before the European cross.”
