Sheeee's Baaack :-)

Friday morning it was about a squillion degrees with two squillion percent humidity. I got out there early enough to put in 4k before joining the Regatta Runners for their 6am start, and by this stage I was already drenched in sweat.

But as uncomfortable as conditions were it was worth getting out there as Clairie was finally back from her almost two weeks away in Perth! She and I ran almost at the back of the pack and just chatted and caught up on goss. By the turnaround point we were both really suffering from the heat so I'm not sure how we managed to get back home faster. I can't remember the pace we were running, I think Clarie said we finished doing around 5min kms. It felt slower than that so I suppose that's a good sign.

Had some good music to keep me company in the first part of my run, thanks to Al (Mr Clairie) who lent me his iPod while mine is in getting fixed. Thanks also must go to the 10 year old who showed me how to adjust the volume after I somehow or other turned it right down and couldn't for the life of me work out how to turn it back up again.

Easy Eight

Wednesday morning was a very easy 8kms along the bike path. When I set out I wasn't sure how far I would go but decided it didn't care how far I went or how long it took.

I'd worn my Skins for about 10 hours Tuesday after my 28k at the Fatass run that morning and they seemed to help with the recovery. So basically I just wanted to roll the legs over and see what hurt. I had a little niggle in my right ankle but the muscles were fine, the only time I could feel them was running down the steep driveway back into my place.

The only thing that really hurt was my pride when this big guy ran past me as if I was standing still :-)

Fats Festive Fatass Run

This run is from The Gap to Jolly's Lookout, and beyond and back for some (not us!). Glenno, Lizzle and I decided a while ago that we'd take two cars to Jolly's and then one back to the start. They were planning a one way trip (22k). I was going to play it by ear, though I thought I'd probably just run an out and back, maybe up to an hour each way, depending on how I felt. Anyway, this whole driving arrangement meant getting up at 3.25am - yikes!

It was great to see such a roll up - there would have been about 30 of us there. The run is all on fire trails and is hilly as hell. In fact it seemed way worse than last year. Then again, this year was several degrees hotter and probably twice as humid.

The first couple of kms I was at the back, happy to be taking it easy. But those around me started walking up the big hills and I just kept on running so got away from them. Dunno why but I was feeling strong and eventually passed maybe half the group as they were all doing the walk/run thing. We had a regroup at around 9k before we were off again.

After an hour I was still going great, though by this stage was basically running on my own as the group ahead were way faster, and those behind were throwing in a bit a walking or had turned back for home. As it turned out for the rest of my run I was alone. It got to 1hr 20min and I figured I might as well keep going another 10 mins before heading back.

The trusty Garmin told me I'd done just over 14k when I turned around. Shortly after I passed Robbie heading up the hill, he said he couldn't see anyone behind him. It must've been another km before I met up with a group including Lizzle and Glenno. Gee, I'm never in front of these guys in a training run :-) They suggested I forget about running back to the start, the finish was closer, but I kept going on my merry way.

Needless to say around the 20k mark I started to struggle. It was so incredibly humid, and by then I'd drunk most of my water. I worked out a rationing system, just a couple of mouthfuls every 2k. And funny, it seemed almost the whole out journey was uphill, but obviously not, there were some killer hills on the way back as well. For a while there I thought I must've taken a wrong turn and was heading back to Jolly's!

It was a welcome site to see that first house right at the start of the trail, even if there was a giant black dog in there going nutso and looking intent climbing over the fence and eating me.

The trusty Garmin showed just over 28k and 2hr 55min by the time I finished, so the return trip was 5 minutes quicker. My legs were really killing me. My shoes were so full of sweat they were squelching. I was dying of thirst and was so nauseous I couldn't even look at the protein bar I had in the car. But oh, what a feeling :-)

Xmas Day Track Session

It was a 5.30am start at the track at UQ on Xmas Day. Glenno had kindly offered to pick me up on his way through. It seeemed like a good idea at the time, but when I was sitting a the bus stop on Coro Dve with a bottle of champers, decked in my Xmas running attire, including the trusty Xmooose hat, and a Chrissy balloon tied to me I thought otherwise. I got some funny looks from drivers going by and a chap out on his morning walk even inquired whether I was on my way to or home from a party.

About a dozen or so turned up for the session and we started with a 3k warm-up around the uni. Then it was on to the track. Most of the group were doing 400 meter reps, but after my 32k the day before I opted just to run continually at a steady pace. Besides, during our strides I could feel a little pain where I tore my muscle - *big sigh* is it really gonna take 18 months before it gets totally better like a couple of people have told me :-( Anyway, I did eight laps so that brought my total for the morning to just over 6k.

Christmas cheer followed in the way of champers and OJ, and some nice cold fruit - watermelon, cherries and frozen grapes. Our special little treat were home made brownies that Little Tara had whipped up.

What a great way to start the day!



Tesso, Lizzle, Big Tara, Little Tara



MJ and Matty



Glenno

Merry Kiss Moose

I got up around 4.15am but it was over half an hour later before I got out the door. I did about 4k at a steady pace before hooking up with Karen back at The Regatta. At a similar pace we headed out to just past the Vic Bridge before turning back to meet up with the 6am starters. I realised then that I'd forgotten to sunscreen my face and she said she hadn't sunscreened at all. We had a few minutes to spare when we got back so zipped into my place and remedied the situation, though it wasn't an easy task as we were both drenched in sweat by then, it was so humid.

There must've been 50 starters at The Regatta, don't think we've ever had that many. And to our surprise we had a very special guest along - Kelvin Marshall! When it came time to head of the group split into three, one lot went to Mt Coot-tha, others to UQ, and the rest of us along the bike path.

Karen, John (from Pat's) and I ended up running together with Scott about 50 meters ahead. When they decided to turn for home I called out to Scotty and we ran to New Farm Park. Pat was out kayaking in one of his squillions of funny Xmas hats and gave us a hoy and we stopped for a quick chat. Ran into Min along the way too.

The return leg from New Farm Park was hard yakka, and by the time we got to the Gardens I told Scotty I'd hit the wall, and was going to slow down, walk even. By this stage I'd done close to 27k. But strangely I started feeling great, and actually put the foot down, picked up the pace and was able to keep it going all the way home.

Ended up doing 32k in around 3hrs 5mins. I only had a coffee beforehand, and drank just water along the way, aside from a little Endura, but didn't feel like I needed anything else.

So it was a good confidence builder. I would've like to have gotten an earlier start, it was so hot by the end. I don't think it was a good idea at all wearing my moose Xmas hat.

Not sure why it takes me over half an hour to get ready to go for a run, especially when I have everything set out the night before. Gonna have to do some transition (bed to road) training I think :-)

Jingle Bells, Batman Smells

As expected my massage on Tuesday hurt like hell. So much so that I skipped my Wednesday run because my legs, glutes and hips were too sore. I had a bit of referred pain in my head from it too .... then again, maybe that was from the red wine and Cointreau at a Xmas dinner the night before :-)

This morning was Pat's Xmas run, and what a hoot! Just about everyone came dressed in something Christmassy, and for those who didn't Pat had an extra supply of things for them. There was even a superhero - Big Dan wore his Phantom costume, nicely accessorised with sparkly purple antlers. Several of the gang brought their kids along, they were all armed with water pistols.

But gee, it might be that time of year but we weren't gonna get away with anything. He told the first group (we start our warmup 5 mins earlier than the fast dudes) to run to the Gardens. We tried to sneak over the Goodwill Bridge but he called us back and made us go the long way, via the Victoria Bridge.

On the pgm was 2 x 4 min efforts and then about 10 minutes of Goodwill Bridge reps. At the end of each of the efforts and each bridge rep the kiddies would squirt us with water. The final rep was all the way to The Ship Inn and then we warmed down and stopped at the pool. Here Pat's daughter had set up all our usual little treats, plus some special ones like croissants and champagne.

We even had a secret Santa for those who wished to be in it, and I did well, scoring a bottle of champers and some chockies!

.... simply having a wonderful Christmas time :-)

I don't get out of bed for less than $10000 a day

I think we had record numbers at Pat's this morning - I tried to count, there were maybe about 50 all up. And most came adorned in the official Pat Carroll Running Group gear too because we had Glenno, photographer for R4YL mag, taking snaps to go with the article Matty has written for the January issue.

On the pgm was 8 x 1 minute efforts, though we ended up doing 6 x 1 min and 1 x 2 minute. The recoveries were short, around 30 seconds. On the warm-down we stopped in front of Admiralty Towers and did some back and forth running so more action photos could be taken.

Then it was back to South Bank for our usual post run treats and, for those who could hang back a little, some more pics. This time it was laps of up the stairs next to the Ship Inn and down the ramp. Following this we went to the Goodwill Bridge and ran up the hill on it several times as Glenno took his final shots.

So not too painful a session today really.

Off for a massage shortly. Now that's gonna be painful.

iPlod

The legs seemed to have recovered okay from Saturday's big effort, but I didn't really feel like getting out there this morning. Still I managed to be out the door at the relatively late hour of 7am, thinking it was gonna be warm and regretting that lazy lie in.

Surprisingly there was a bit of a breeze so it wasn't too bad. I just wanted an easy run, maybe 8 to 10k so ran along the bike path and into the Gardens to the 5k mark. Was feeling fine so ran a further 1km before turning around for home. Not too many runners out and about this morning, though I was a bit later than usual. Saw Tim in his work gear riding in the other direction, and just coming out of the Gardens Lew came along on his bike and cycled beside me for about a km. We had a chat about upcoming events, he's training for his 7th Hell Of The West triathlon in Goondiwindi in Feb. And next on his list is Canberra Marathon.

Ran about 5:50 pace I guess, and had some good music on the iPod to keep me entertained. Though its had a bit of an injury this past week, every time I turn up the volume it stops and starts as if the battery is almost flat. Its seeing the iPodiatrist at the Apple store tomorrow :-)

Mission Accomplished

With Caboolture Dusk to Dawn just a month and a half away I'm leaving it a bit late to get some serious training in if I want to do the 12 hour event. Still, I'm gonna give it a go - the training that is - and see what happens.

Saturday I wanted 'time on the feet' and the goal was to be out there for at least four hours. I got to South Bank just before 4.40am and ran on my own before hooking up with the rest of the crew who were starting at 6am.

Then we all headed toward New Farm, and with my plan for the morning I was glad all were in cruisey mode. Got to New Farm Park and Mark (iliketoast), Phil, Scott and I continued on, the rest went back. We ran up to the ferry terminal at Teneriffe and turned around there. Scotty and I eventually slowed down even more as the other two bolted off.

We got back to South Bank and I'd run for 3 hours and done around 31k I'd say. I stopped for a quick cold drink with the others at Chez Laila, which turned into a not so quick cold drink, maybe 50 mins. The last thing I felt like doing then was going back out there. But I did. I walked for about 15 mins, ran for 30 mins, then walked another 15 mins. In hindsight I think it was more the heat (it was over 30 degrees when I finished) than fatigue that got me in the end.

What a long morning. After getting up just after 4am I didn't get home until 10.30am. With 3 1/2 hrs running (covering approx 36k) and 1/2 hr walking (maybe 3k) I had 4 hours on my feet. Also I had almost an hour on my bum at the cafe. Obviously I have too much time on my hands :-)

Intervals of sorts

I got early this morning, drove to work and then ran from there back to The Regatta for their 6am run. It always seems kinda weird doing this seeing though I live right across the road from the place. The Regatta that is, not work :-)

On the way there saw Tori on her bike, bumped into Glenda and stopped for a catch-up, then passed a fuel-belted up Gerard who called out to me that he was doing his long run. Got to the Regatta in time for a quick chat to Clairie and Lizzle before we all took off for the run to the city.

We three girls were right at the back of the pack, enjoying a slow run and catching up on gossip from the past 24 hours. We turned around at the 3k marker, then stopped at the nearby tap for a good 10 mins for one last chatter before I had to leave them to run back through the city to work.

So this morning's session was - 20 mins easy, 5 mins talk, 2 mins easy, 5 mins talk, 20 mins easy, 10 mins talk, 5 mins easy.

Pat's, pool, and Poppy's - perfect!

In an attempt to beat the heat Pat's is now starting at 5:40am, though this morning it seemed just as humid as it would have been 20 mins later. After the warm up to the Gardens and before we were about to get into the real stuff Pat gave his usual little motivational speech. At the end he mentioned Clairie wouldn't be here for our Xmas run and so to make sure she didn't miss out on too much fun he pulls out THE melon sundress for her to throw on. Its the first time ever its been worn .... by a girl!

Today we heading out from the amphitheatre doing sets of 2 mins fast, 30 sec jog, 1 min fast, 30 sec jog, 2 min fast, 30 sec standing recovery. then turning around and doing the same set back again. The aim was to arrive to the start at the end of the last effort. I got back with about 10 seconds to spare so must've really pushed it coming home, er, or been slack on the out journey ;-)

Then we ventured out again, all running hard until the fastest person got to the Edward St gates. Once they turned around, everyone could turn around. Oh, how I was willing those frontrunners on! Again I was really pushing it, and was only about 10 meters back from a pack that included Nick, Jodi and Jo. Heading back the other way I was gave it my all but just couldn't keep up the pace. Then I heard Pat yell we had to finish by running up that dreaded grassy hill - arrgghhh!

We warmed down by going over the Goodwill Bridge and ran through South Bank to the pool where we were supposed to turn around and go back to the Ship Inn. But the lure of the water was too much and most of the group stopped right there, kicked off the shoes, and jumped in.

After our little dip and the post run treats that Pat provides (now includes icy-poles!) those who could headed to Poppy's for Clairie's farewell brekky. At least this Poppy isn't sloppy, though to be on the safe side I didn't order the pie ;-)

Surely She Can't Be Siri-ous

Even though it was my day off the plan was to hit the road early. I do remember seeing 5:20 on the clock, and 6:10, and even 7:00. Managed to haul myself out of bed around 7:30am and stuffed around for so long that it almost 8:00 before I set out for my run.

Just checking the Met Bureau site now I see it was 29.5 degrees when I left home and 32.4 about an hour later when I got back. I thought it was a bit warmish. It was a very cruisey run, I listened to some recently acquired tunes including some from The Sadies and Ryan Adams, kinda went well with the pace I was doing.

Bumped into Siri and AB on their bikes a couple of hundred meters from home on the return journey. Siri had done the 50k solo at Kurrawa on Sunday, and done it in record time (3:54) - how the hell does she recover so well!

After the race she had been talking to me about getting an Australian ladies team together for the World 100k Champs next October, talking, you know, as if she wanted me to be part of it. I figured she'd just spent too long in the sun. But she was on about it again this morning, and getting very excited about the prospect. She said you can have up to six in the team, and they take the top four times. She said something about the men's team not finishing and how the girls could show them a thing or two. I tried to explain that I've never run anywhere close to that distance before, not to mention I was slow! Anyway, I went mad at her for putting ideas in my head and wished her a Merry Christmas.

Mid morning it was back to Adam the physio for what I thought might be the final session. Alas, there is still more work to be done. He thinks the hammy/glute pain I had last week was probably a minor tear and so has given me even more strengthening exercises.

Hit the gym late afternoon for the usual upper body weights, abs, and some stretching. Came home and did all my physio exercises, I think there's 9 or 10 different ones now, so it takes quite a while to get through them.

Gees, this whole fitness caper is becoming very time consuming.

Kurrawa piccies

With my favourite running buddy, Clairie, before kick off




With with Tara and Karisma mid race




Lizzle, Clairie, me, and my relay partner Nick




With my zippy relay partner Nick in our post run 'uniforms'

Kurrawa (Not Quite) 25k

The nerves certainly hit this morning in the hour or so leading up to the Kurrawa to Pt Danger 50k Relay. A few of us had stayed overnight at a lovely unit near the start line, but with a 5am kick off it still meant getting up at 3.30am after a restless night to down a little brekky.

From the time we took off I kept a close eye on the trusty Garmin. The plan was to run around 4:45 pace and within the first 500m or so could only watch as Clairie, Karisma and Liz_N took off. As tempted as I was to go with them I knew it would prove to be disastrous later on in the race so stuck with my game plan. For the first several kms all appeared to be a few hundred meters in front.

Tara and I were behind them and ran up the stairs at Miami together. We really seemed to gain some ground on Liz_N and Karisma right then. But as we came down the hill on the other side I had a bit of a wardrobe malfunction - I trying to tighten my fuel belt it fell off! So it was a bit of a scramble to collect the bottles and the iPod that had hit the ground and put it all back on. The lovely Tara was just so so so thoughtful, stopping and helping me as the girls got away from us and others passed us. I told her to keep going but she wouldn't hear of it.

A while later Tara said she was going to slow down and I suggested she wait until we reeled Liz_N in, which we managed to do though it was a loooong time later. At least it kept her going :-) We soon passed Karisma too though I was waiting for her to come back at us any second.

My relay partner Nick (Rent Boy) was fantastic. He was stopping every few kms and giving us cold water. Running through the markets at Coolangatta Tara got away from me and was maybe 50 meters or so in front and stayed there until the hill at Pt Danger. I was happy about this after she so kindly stopped mid race to help me out. But going up that horrible mean nasty hill, knowing the finish line was so close and realising I might crack 2 hours I just had to push and felt bad passing her.

I had a big mixture of music on the iPod and as I was running up that hill a great song called "Blues My Naughtie Sweetie Gives To Me" was playing. I'd taken it off a blues compilation CD Robert Song had made me. I looked up and low and behold Robert Song himself was running back in the opposite direction!

Anyway, I flew down the other side of the hill to Duranbah but the clock had ticked over 2 hours - time 2:00.15. And as suspected the Garmin called it in at 23.99kms, we always figured the course wasn't quite 25k. A slap of Nick's hand and he was off. There was a brief little congregation there as we all compared times but we soon had to head off to support our boys.

Clairie and I travelled back together and it was great to spend that post race time with her. I was just so proud of how she ran today. I won't go into detail here, you can read it about it in her blog.

We had a little interclub team thing going, and Lizzle had run and incredible 1:50.30 so we thought that it was all over rover for the rest of us. Shame, Clairie's partner Robbie was having a tough day in the office, but refused to give up. If the weather had been several degrees cooler I have no doubt he would have romped home and the trophy would have been theirs. In fact, all smart money was on them to do just that.

As the kms wore on Nick edged closer and closer to Lizzle's partner Glenno. We stopped when there was about 2k to go and timed it, Nick was only 1:24 behind him. Clairie and I raced to the finish to see them run in. Glenno crossed first (1:58.??), with Nick just seconds behind (1:48.52). So it was victory to Lizzle and Glenno in our little team challenge, and a well deserved one too. But boy, Nick and I got oh so close.

I'm really happy with my run today even though I missed that elusive sub 2 hours by a number of seconds. And I ran roughly the same time as last year, give or take five seconds. Considering I missed training through most of October due to injury, and then really have only had a handful of decent speed session since I wasn't going to be too disappointed if I was closer to 2:05.

Perhaps had it not been for the fuel belt incident I could have done it. Oh well, a goal for next year.

Prognosis Positive

Because of the hammy and glute pain I decided to skip the planned Friday Regatta Run and rest. Hit the gym in the afternoon for a easy stretch and abs session but strangely felt motivated enough to do all my weights as well. Between there and home I did all my physio stuff too.

This morning (Saturday) the hammy was still a little sore when walking. Actually its even hurts as I sit here typing. Anyway, I wanted to give it a try before tomorrow. There were about 8 of us there amongst the crowd this morning who are doing Kurrawa and we declared it was going to be short and slow, with mine maybe being the shortest and slowest of the lot.

The minute I started running it felt fine, no hint of any pain at all. Woohoo! Mark (iliketoast), MJ and I turned around at the 2k mark and let the others run on. The other Kurrawa runners were away an hour, but apparently 20 minutes of that was spent leaning on a railing talking. Hmmmm, last minute secret training.

The Brisbane Running Buddies have got a number of mixed teams in for tomorrow and at brekky the trophy was unveiled, as were the Fruit Loops wreaths for the winners. Glenno put the trophy together using and an old tennis one and a running one. Its perpetual, backdated to 2004. So Nick and I get to have it for six months for our victory last year. With a bit of luck (and if all the others sleep in and miss the start) we'll get to have it for twelve :-)

Pain In The Butt

I'm starting to think the 'easy' session we do the Thursday after our 3k TT is cursed. Last time I did it was October and that day, even though I was probably only going 80%, I got injured.

Today we had 6 x 1 1/2 minute efforts and then the traditional 1k No Watch run, where we all put in a gold coin and pre-guess our time. Closest to the mark wins. Well, Camp Quality wins, they get the $$$. Whoever's guess is nearest gets the receipt.

With Kurrawa to Pt Danger relay on Sunday in mind I want to stay in one piece so I really did take it easy this morning in the reps, again maybe around 80% effort at most.

For the 1k Clairie and I had written down 4:45. If we do 25 of them on Sunday we'll run sub 2 hours, so saw it as good pacing practice. I thought she was going a bit fast, and she must've thought I was going a bit slow, after taking off together we soon seperated. We were both right! She did 4:40 and I did 4:51 :-) Tori 'won' today, just one second off.

Felt good after the session, came home and slept a while (worked night shift last night). When I got up I had a sore left hammy and glute :-(

Hopefully its nothing but it does hurt a little when I walk. And sit. So instead of the usual physio exercises in front of Bold and the Beautiful this afternoon it was just icing. And I don't mean on the cake.

Bugger bugger bugger.

3k TT

It was the monthly 3k TT at Pat's this morning. Going my rep times from last week I set myself a goal of going sub 12:30. Its quite a way off my PB of 11:53 set in February but I didn't want to be too ambitious.

After our strides we were off. At around the 400 meter mark Clairie cruised by and I thought it was strange she didn't do her usual flying start. But she sure looked comfy and everytime we passed she looked to be moving well. A peek at her blog and you'll see just how well!

Anyway, I hit 1k in 4:01 feeling okay. The second km always seems the hardest so I just focussed again on hanging just behind the girls I had been chasing. The time at 2k was 8:15 I think, so not a good second km. I knew I had to really push to get under that 12:30 mark. Put on a sprint about 100m from the finish and crossed in 12:28.

Goal achieved. So I should be pleased I guess. But I'm not. Its my slowest TTk since June 2004. Talk about a lot of work to be done :-(

But that's not the main reason I'm not happy. In hindsight I reckon I set the bar too low. To be honest I could've done just a little faster today, I know I could've pushed myself more than I did. Not a lot harder, but harder no less. And I certainly could have started the sprint for home at least 100 meters sooner. Its not the time I ran that I'm not happy about, but how I ran.

So spent the next hour or two beating myself up. Then went and had a massage and got beaten up a bit more.

It Was Supposed To Be So Easy ....

.... and it was!

Hit the road just before 6am on Sunday for a planned easy 40 minutes or so. It might have been early but the sun was well and truly up and it was pretty warm. I spotted Phil waiting at the Regatta for their Sunday group and thought about joining in but decided against it. I just wanted to run my own easy run and listen to some music. About the 2k mark I ran into Cameron (CR Daedal) doing a river loop on his bike and stopped for a chat for 5 mins or so.

Got a little further down the bike path into the shade and figured I'd turn around at the Vic Bridge which would give me about 7 1/2 km, that shade and a slight breeze made for pretty pleasant conditions.

What I was listening was The Streets 'A Grand Don't Come For Free' CD on the iPod ...

"I reckon you're an eight or a nine, maybe even a nine and a half in four beers time" :-)

Last time I heard it I got to the final song and realised there was some sort of story flowing through the album. I wanted to listen to the words of each song to see if I could figure it all out. So that meant I had to run a little further than planned.

Ended up doing a lazy-ish 10k loop in close to an hour (excluding chat time). Pretty much worked out the story too :-)

Cool Runners

The plan for Saturday was an easy 90 minutes. I was certainly looking forward to a relaxed run, thinking back none of the sessions I'd done a week and a half had been cruisey. Didn't wear the Garmin but measured via UBD on disk and we ended up doing around 17k in the hour and a half.

About a dozen of us headed from The Ship Inn through Kangaroo Pt and over the Story Bridge and back to the city. The pace was a little brisk. When we regrouped at the Gardens we realised we'd lost a few people. We figured they'd gone on to New Farm so just waited long enough to be sure.

It was then that Clairie and I decided it was time to slow down a little, this wasn't the pace we were after. Phil, who Clairie had been calling Gerard all morning :-), stuck with us as we hung back. Still, we were never really more than about 100 meters from Glenno, Lizzle, Robbie and Geoff as we headed out to Orliegh Park. They turned for home a couple of hundred meters before us, we went right up to the ferry terminal.

Just quietly, if I'd been carrying money, I would have stopped right there and then and ferried back to South Bank. Even though I'd had a rest day Friday I was struggling a bit, and it was such a humid morning. I remember at one point Clairie pointing out to me that my hair was dripping with sweat. Well, at least now we didn't feel obliged to keep the fast guys in our sights.

Phil left us at the Vic Bridge to run home. Just as Clairie and I were running past the beach at South Bank three little heads bobbed up out of the water and called out to us - it was Glenno, Lizzle and Geoff. Couldn't resist the urge to join them so it was off with the shoes and into the nice cold water for 10 minutes or so - beautiful! Though I don't think we looked too beautiful sitting at our post run brekky like a bunch of drowned rats :-)

2 Out Of 3 Ain't Bad

.... but 1 out of 2 ain't good.

Thursday at Pat's was 2 x 2km and 1 x 1km with 90 secs recovery between each. My goal was to do the 2ks under 8:20 and the 1k under 4:10.

Headed off for the first 2k and up to about the 1k mark was running with Tori and Scotty, but I managed to break away from them after that. As expected Scotty flew by with about 200m to go and shortly after Tori caught up and we encouraged eachother in a race to the line. Time - 8:19 :-)

Heading out for the second 2k I could definitely feel the effects of the long run the day before. Still, I tried to keep Clairie (who had taken off earlier) in my sights and not let her increase the distance between us. I almost managed to do that but failed in my bid to go sub 8:20. Time - 8:35 :-(

I knew before I started the 1k was gonna be sad, I was knackered! Clairie took off about 10 secs before I did and again I tried to keep that same distance, but try as I did she just got further and further in front. Time - 4:18 :-(

I guess our fastish longish run on Wednesday caught up with me. Still, with goals of better marathons and ultras I like the idea of throwing in a decent mid-week effort as we did, even if the speed work suffers slightly the next day.

Claire, the moment I met you, I swear ....

Well Clairie, maybe not quite the moment I met you Wednesday morn, but certainly within a couple of kms I was swearing ;-)

****

Clairie and I set off for our Wednesday morning run just before 5am. The plan was to run 'solidly' for 90 minutes, 45 mins out and 45 mins back.

We started at Fitness First at North Quay, went down to the bike path, over the Goodwill Bridge and through Kangaroo Point. Rather than take the usual route back up over the Story Bridge and to New Farm we got a little adventurous and ran the pathway in front of Dockside. From here we wound our way through a few hilly streets to Mowbray Park at East Brisbane then up Wynnum Rd. We got to Norman Park at the 45 minute mark and so turned around there and went back basically the same way, though missed a turn under the Story Bridge and that actually added a little extra.

At the turnaround point we knew then we were somewhere near Mark's (iliketoast) place and contemplated dropping in for, er, toast. But thought that maybe Katy (ihatetoast) was on brekky duty and so just kept running. We like toast!

From the minute we started running I knew it was gonna be a tough one, the pace was certainly 'solid'. Those little uphills we found slowed us down a bit but I guess we made up for it on the downhills and the flat. It wasn't until we got close to the 15k mark that I realised we were only a couple of minutes behind the time I ran in the BRRC race on Sunday.

Then with a few kms to go any thought of taking it easy was gone as there was a girl in front we 'had' to catch! It took us about a km but we got her, only because she stopped ;-) After that I think we both got a sniff of the finish and even though it was hard work just kept up the momentum.

The return leg took 42 1/2 mins, a negative split! The trusty Garmin told me we had done 17.97km. That works out to about 4:52 pace.

For a mid-week longish run it was a killer. I was stuffed! I'm also stuffed if I know how I ran faster than that pace at the GC Marathon this year, well, for the first 37k anyway.

Felt soooo good afterwards though. Well, until my 11am physio appointment.