Going away

Not to the nut house, but for a week to the north for some skiing and sight seeing etc. Hopefully I can blog up there and read yours. Take care and I'll be back proper on the 5th of Jan. I'll be thinking about you all. All the best with your activities over the holiday season.

Race Report

Everything was fine for the race I had a good race plan, the course was flat and fast and the weather near perfect. So why isn't this blog post titled "PB"? Read on.

This is the first time I've ran this marathon so I wasn't sure exactly what to expect but I was very happy with the course. About a one third of it was on road and the other two followed the river up and back. It was paved in sections but mostly we were running on hard dirt.

It was 13 to 15 degrees and not a cloud in the sky a little wind but nothing that worried me. The times it gusted up I'd just slip behind some other runners. The plan was to do the first 8 to 10 K in 4:15 per K and if I felt it too slow after that drop to 4:05~4:10 for the last 10K.

Well things didn't go exactly to plan. I lined up at the very front because I was a little late getting to the starting area and it was either there or right at the back cause I couldn't find a way in the middle. There were about 2000 runners and the start was a narrow street fenced on both sides.

The gun cracked and we were off down a small hill and around a corner and up over a bridge and down the other side where a flat bitumen path stretched out parallel to the river.

I hit the first K in 3:52 carried along by the crowd I didn't think I was running at that pace I thought I'd slow down but frankly I felt fine and thought I just ignore coach Pat's and Clairie's advice to go out slower. The next 2nd K I did in 3:58 and the following in 3:55 that's the first 3K in 11:45. I was pretty happy with myself and felt strong and full of air so I pushed on with it.

I did the next two Ks in 4:03 and 4:07 respectively rounding off the 5K in 19:55.
the next 5K I pretty much held my pace but dropped down 10 seconds on the 6th K and a few seconds each K after that until the 10th K. The total for the 10K was 41:33 about 1 minute off my 10K PB.

Now for the next half I was going to take coach Pat's advice and pick it up a bit and come home strong. Well the 11th K I did but from the 12 to the 16th, where I stopped taking splits, I was slowly dropping a few seconds each K, the 16th and last Split recorded on my watch was 4:34.

The remaining 5 Ks were pretty ugly in comparison to the first 5 but gave me plenty of time to think what I dick I was. The last K, try as I might, I couldn't pick up the pace. My feet were hot, a burning sensation on the bottom soft part of the inner arch of my left foot, my dodgy ankle was hurting and I was almost all out of air.

I cross in 1:31:37 a reasonable time by my standards but not the time I was looking for at the 10 K mark. Anyway as they say "what doesn't kill me blah blah blah."

Ten minutes after the race I regained my breath and felt good enough to jog back 2K to meet my family at a shopping center. I couldn't believe I couldn't have just done the remaining 3 K a little faster but I was spent at that time and at the limit of my fitness.

Regardless I had a great run, enjoyed myself as usual, and learnt somethings about myself. One thing in particular I learnt was that I'm still a cocky bastard and I don't listen to good advice.

Not to worry, my 10K PB of 40:10 looks to be in jeopardy this coming January.

Star Man

Thanks for all your recent comments I appreciate it and really get a kick out of reading what you write. I will respond in kind but today I have a christmas party for the kids that I have to go and organise. I'll leave you with my song of the week. A nice slideshow I'm sure you'll enjoy. I like his song "star man" the most and ever since I first heard it its been in my head. But I couldn't find a clear clip so here's another favourite.

Forward progress

Things are going well here the weather, although cold, has improved this last week and the sun has come out. On Tuesday I did a session of 3 x 2K with the goal to get them all under 7:45 per 2K. I was able to do the 1st 2K in 7:22, the 2nd in 7:30, and the 3rd in 7:40. I don't know if I have the endurance to run a PB for this coming Saturday's half because I missed a couple of long runs of late, but we will see come race day.

It's a new race for me and we are expecting great running conditions so anything could happen. It's interesting training and exciting racing I pretty much love this sport.

Two or three kilos

It is now 8 weeks before the Tokyo marathon and I think it would be better for me to go into this race 2 or 3 kilos lighter than I am now. I'm just a little worried that if I cut back too much on food I won't have the energy to do some of my high mileage weeks.

Any advice would be appreciated.

That's it!

I could have cried today, only ten minutes into my long run and this ankle pain comes back. I said to my self "that's it back to square one!" It was hurting pretty badly and I thought I'd better head back to the car.

Anyway, I was walking back and decided to give my calf a massage and try again, did that and pain was still there. I flopped down on a grassy embankment, lay back and put my hands over my face in frustration. After laying there for five minutes, contemplating taking up darts, I sat up and did a few stretches touching my toes. I got up and tried again, but this time it felt OK. I sat down again and slowly stretched in the same manor holding the stretch for the count of 15, 4 times on each leg. It was pretty hard to hold these as my legs were tight as.

After I got up again I ran for an hour and a half with no problems at all. So that was it, tight hamstrings! I kinda feel silly that I didn't pick it up sooner but very happy that I did and relieved that I have nothing more than lack of flexibility.

I'm going to introduce some stretching into my progam now. Does anyone know of good ones to fix tight hamstrings? I want to know more about the working of the muscles and tendons etc it is amazing to me how tight back upper legs can give me a feeling of pain coming from deep low in the ankle.

All over the place

Well my running was all over the place this week, with kids being off and my sore ankle I couldn't run as per my plan. But all is not lost cause after my run today I had no ankle pain and generally feel in good shape. I haven't had the build up I wanted to do a PB in my half next week still if I'm in good shape at the starting line I'll have a chance.

I need a good speed session to give me some confidence going into the next race as I missed out on Friday's planned one and I feel a little sluggish. I'll include a recent photo of my boys the reason I couldn't do my run yesterday. Their mother wanted to go out with her friends and asked if I could look after them for the day. I dare not refuse as there are sharp knives in our house!

Wet, wet, wet.

Had a bit of rain around here the last few weeks and while I usually like running in the rain it is getting a little old coming back from a run with the only thing dry being my throat, inside that is. Anyways my mother told me there'd be days like these.

On the injury front I managed a couple of runs without any major pain but I think I damaged my left Achilles so I'm icing and massaging my calf as suggested by you good people.

I think I pin-pointed when I did the damage, it was while running 100m sprints as a warm up before a speed session. In my last of 6x100 I ran it in 14sec too fast for my little legs to handle. In my mind I was staring down Carl Lewis and he blinked!

So Fucken Special

I'm on the mend, no worries, I think? Anyway I want to post this song for Tesso and Clairie in honor of their run on Sunday. As the song says!

Injury?

I don't know exactly what's wrong but something is wrong with my ankle. On Friday I decided to cut my speedwork session as in the warm up I had pain in my ankle that caused me to limp a little. Anyway, I rested on Saturday and it felt fine but 20 mins into my long run today, Sunday, I got the pain back again and cancelled this run too.

The pain is a throbbing aching pain that feels like it's coming from deep inside and envelopes the whole area around the ankle. Yet when I stop running or only walk the pain goes away, although I still have a strange sensation there.

I will rest up today and tomorrow and try again on Tuesday.

X-Ray Spex

Thought I'd bring my song of the week forward a bit so as Tesso and Clairie could get some inspiration for their Sunday race from Poly Styrene and the X-ray Spex. Turn it up and run until you can't no more!

Hills

Did hill work yesterday which was pretty hard on the breathing after my cold. Though it did work to clear me right out and I feel good today. Just about to go out and do a longish hour and a half. I brought some new running gear this morning, long lycra pants, socks and ski type underware to protect me from the cold so I'm ready for the winter months of training.

Still I envy those in Australia who are able to run with only a "camel back, "lycra thong" and a "cheeky grin."

Yesterday

Did a longish run yesterday first one in 5 days. This is the first time I've taken so many days off running in a row since I don't know when. Anyway, the legs felt great the first 4omins no niggles or pain at all. I don't remember running on such fresh legs for a while either.

And apart from spiting up some residue phlegm I think I'm back. It's kind of strange how hard it was coming back after only five days out I can imagine how difficult it would be to start running again after an extended break I don't want to try that.

Building Confidence

Tesso was talking about Pat Carroll's group runs on her blog today.

I heard he might be introducing some affirmations to his training sessions like the ones below. Well, running is half mind games!

Long Run

Time for my song of the week. Like most others I like an eclectic mix of music, but I'm a bit of a closet cowboy and I like country music a fair bit.
You may want to listen to this before your Sunday morning run.

By the way don't these old buggers still sound good!

Feelin' better

Well it's the 5th day with this cold and just starting to get over it. I haven't run since last Sunday's long run I'm a little frustrated and I reckon I've lost a little fittness.

Still on the plus side the muscles down the bottom of the shins on both sides were sore to the touch for the last couple of weeks and there is no pain if I push those areas now.

I'll do a short 30min run tomorrow and a short long run on Sunday and I'll be right to continue my build up from Monday as usual.