Sunday 27/2/2005

It was my first stint as Race Director for the Brisbane Road Runners today. I was very fortunate to have a good band of helpers turn up. The responsibiltiy was made much easier having some very experienced people there like Ian Javes and Keith Chaston to give me guidance.
The event went really well, the highlight being Clairies 10K PB. We had an excellent turn out with 131 finishers total for the 20K, 10K and 5K events.

Saturday 26/2/2005

23k's today in 1:58. Pat had me down for the 20k race at Brisbane Road Runners tomorrow but as I am the race director I won't be able to do it. I found today very hard going and thought that if I am feeling like this running only 23k, how the hell am I going to do 50k. I am wondering if I should back off on the speed training between now and Canberra......... how necessary is speed training between now and then? I seem to be getting very negative don't I? Never-the-less I am really looking forward to Canberra.

Friday 25/2/2005

Headed out on my 11.3K circuit this morning at about 4:50AM and found it really hard to get moving so took it very slowly. It took me a massive 1:03:18. Strangely enough my legs feel really good now. Over the last couple of weeks I have found that when I get up to move, after sitting for a while, my legs are really stiff. Today is different.........I hope it lasts.

Thursday 24/2/2005

Another very good speed session this morning - 3 X 4 min and 1 X 2 min sprints. It doesn't seem much on paper but I worked up a pretty good sweat. We have the 3K time trial on Tuesday.....something to look forward to. I am conscious that Canberra is getting closer and I need to find the balance between going all out in speed work and making sure the body is ready to endure the 50K.

Wednesday 23/02/2005

Once again I did my 15.7 Wednesday circuit. I stuck to, what I term, my recovery pace to finish in 80:36, averaging 5:05. It's quite dark when I set out 4:50AM so I wear a reflective band around my ankle.

Tuesday 22/02/02

A real crowd at Pat's Training Group today. We were privileged to have Action the Coolrunning Strider with us this morning. We did 15 minutes of hills in the City Gardens. I felt really good today, which probably means I wasn't working hard enough. My excuse is that my hip is coming good and I didn't want to agravate it. Howerver, RITH didn't manage to lap me so that was a good sign.
Poor Clairie twisted her ankle and was sidelined. I hope it is not serious Clairie.

Saturday 19/2/2005

Saturday is usually a rest day but some of my Park Road running friends aren't able to make it on Sunday. When the alarm went off at 4:10 this morning I was in rest day mode and found it a little hard to get moving. We set out at a little past 5:00 and took it nice and steady. By the time we had run along the river to Breakfast Creek and back we had covered 23k and been running for 2 hours. My right hip/leg is still bothering me but after 5 or 6 K's it settles down. At the end of the run this morning I felt like I could have just kept on going.

Friday 18/2/2005

I decided not to do my 11.3k circuit this morning so that I could aviod a couple of serious hills. It's not the going up, it's the going down that is the problem. I am finding it to jaring on my right leg and hip. I opted, instead, for a less hilly out and back and did 10k in my programmed 50 min.

Thursday 17/2/2005

When I started out on the warm up for the speed session this morning my legs didn't want go with me. I perservered and eventually they submitted. However, when it came time for the 1k efforts Clairie and Tesso took off and I thought I was going to have trouble catching them - I did eventually. My splits were 3:45, 3:49, 3:51, 3:49, 3:48.

Wednesday 16/2/2005

My legs don't normally feel as tired as they do today. I guess they have taken a bit of a caning so far this week. Almost 50k's including a 10 mile race and a speed session.
I did my 15.7k circuit today in 80:32. I did take it easy because my legs wouldn't let me do anything else.

Tuesday 15/2/2005

A good crowd this morning at speed training. 8 x 500m with what was supposed to be1:00min standing recovery and finish off with 1k. I must say I am starting to, um, dare I say, "enjoy" speed training. As ever, it is always so good to have the encouragement from the rest of the group when your out there giving it all you have.

We missed Clairie this morning and we are still missing Puntermatt.

Sunday 13/2/2005

What a great race this morning. We had a good turnout for the Club 10 mile Championship race.

Clairie was there for the first time and true to her recent form, ran an excellent race.

Rith won his category in a blistering time of 61:40. He, understandably, was pretty pleased with that. Rith was in good company this morning - we had the pleasure of having our coach Pat Carroll run with us today - well, with Rith at least.

Chunderchick is on fire. She won her category as well AND was the first female overall. Congratulations Chunderchick.

As for me I got second in my category. I averaged 4:16 to come in at 1:08:45. If I had known that the guy who won my category, 50-54, was actually in my category I would have tried harder. Mind you if I had beaten him I also would have been the outright winner because that is what he was. He was Ron Peters from Toowoomba.

With regards to my hip. Again running seemed to help. After the race I felt really good. Sitting agrivates the problem which leads to believe the problem is Sciatica.

Friday 11/2/2005

What a fantastic day. Took my 11.3 nice and easy this morning and enjoyed every minute. My hip was less troublesome today and managed to average 5:04 to finish in 57:16. Considering that I didn't get to bed until midnight and thought I would be find it hard to get stared this morning, I felt surprisingly good.

Thursday 10/2/2005

Another good session with Pat's group today. 1 x 2k 1.5 min rec, 1 x 1k 1.5 min rec, 2 x 500m 1 min rec, 1 x 2k.

I'm experiencing some discomfort with my right hip. It's Okay after a good warm up but really slowing me at the start. Rith showed me some stretches to do so I will do them and see how I go. I occasionally go through these sorts aches and pains, as I am sure we all do, and usually they go as quickly as they came. However, I woudn't like this one to get any worse.

It was great to have the Qld 50k Champ, Tesso, with us this morning. We run in esteemed company. Clairie is doing really well, week by week she is getting stronger and faster.

Wednesday 9/2/2005

I woke this morning at 4:25 and got up to get ready for my Wednesday 15.7k but decided against it. I have been feeling very tired and lethargic and decided to listen to my body today.

I am getting a bit anxious about having strong enough base to finish the Canberra 50k without killing mysef, so giving up the run this morning was not an easy decision.

Tuesday 8/2/2005

No I'm not going to mention the H word. Suffice it to say that today's conditions were a bit on the extreme side. Not that I'm complaining.

We had a pretty good session this morning with everyone putting in an extraordinary effort. 8 x 1 minute sprints with 45 sec recovery for the first few then Pat's watch seems to start running faster.

Sunday 6/2/2005

We headed out from Park Road this morning, over the Gray Street bridge, up over Highgate Hill, out through Yeronga, Fairfield, Chelmer, over the river at Indooroopilly, through UQ and back to Park Road - 2:40:03 and 29k. I was pretty stuffed by the time we got back - well before we got back actually. The horror stretch for us at this time of year is the path along the river form the Toowong Ferry to Park Road. There is no shade and the sun beats down on the path and reflects off the river.

It was great to see RITH, Chunderchick and a couple of guys from Pat's group, Davis and Mark (Slash we call him) out there. They started from the Regatta and were heading the other way.

Almost forgot to add, for the record, I was running in new shoes today.

Saturday 5/2/2005

Rest day for me today.
I just read about Horrie on CoolRunning. He must have put a super effort in the Striders 10k as he wasn't too good at the end of the race. I hope he is okay.

Friday 4/2/2005

A very slow 11.3K in 59:13 this morning . My legs just didn't seem to want to get into it until about the last K when I was moving along pretty well.

My long run for Sunday is set down as 2:40. I'm looking forward to it. I just won't tell my legs about it.

Thursday 3/2/2005

Pat said we had it easy today because of the big effort in the time trial on Tueasday. Ha! 6 x 2 min with 1 min recovery. I must say though, I went further in the 2 mins than I have in previous sessions and I felt good - breathless but good. The combination of a cool breeze and reducing my pace on Wednesday certainly helped.

Wednesday 2/2/2005

Took it easy today. My 15.7k circuit took me 1:23:42 today( av 5:21 k's). It took me another hour to stop sweating.

Tuesday 1/2/2005

What a great morning. So much effort went into the 3k time trial by everyone. Tesso, after her big weekend in Sydney (5k in 20:03 Saturday, hilly 30k Sunday), knocked 9 sec off her PB to come in under 12mins for the first time. Clairie knocked a whacking great 52 sec off her PB. RITH had a first as well - first time under 10 mins at 9:59. That guy is on fire. Even I came in on the right side of the ledger by 2 sec at 11:19.

All in all it was a very satisfying session.