10km | soft sand | Race | 68:08

I won't hide the fact that I was shitting myself this morning. Not knowing if the task was beyond me I guess. Still I did run 7.5km last weekend so it was just a mental hurdle that needed to be overcome.


I headed down to North Bondi Surf Club and signed on bright and early and collected my race singlet, got chipped and race number drawn on my arm (always wanted one of those).


I chatted to a heap of runners including a Cool lurker who was training for some 500km race in the deserts of China. 50kms per day for 10 days I think. Sheesh !


We gathered at the start shortly before 9.00am and got our race instructions. Soon the whistle (surf life saving thing) went off and we were running. The pack pulled me along at about 5:40/km pace and soon I was dry in the mouth and gasping for air. I could only sustain that sort of pace for 3 laps and slowly dropped of to a reduced pace of about 7:00/km. That was the pace I train at and I knew that I could last the distance without to much dramas.


At the halfway mark I was feeling pretty crap for going out too hard and being a hero and it took a few doses of sports drink to regain my composure.


I got a cheer from CRs Blkbox & Beki at about the 7km mark and I mumbled something like it was only 3 laps to go. Those 3 laps seemed to take forever and all I could do was plod at the same pace and be strong in the mind as it would be all wrapped up in 20 mins. Thanks for the support guys !


I finished in a wobbly 68:08 (exactly 30 mins behind the winner Jeremy Horne LOL) but all in all had a fun morning. I will be backing up in 2008 for sure and might look at the Manly Soft Sand Classic in June or July.

Fat Friday ! **************************** Weight last Friday: 81kgs Weight today: 81kgs Comment: I need some more consistent training ! Too lazy ! **************************** Thursday 26th April 10km | easy Ran into the city this time around ran strong and finished in reasonable form. Tuesday 24th April 10km | easy I ran 10kms down to Bondi and back. Ran it easy with no niggles to report.

7.5km | soft sand | 56:11 I got down to Bondi before 7 this morning with a plan to run 7.5km so mission accomplished there. I ran in the Frees again because of a few pesky blisters from last week. The going was tough as expected but I confess that running kms 6 & 7 felt like that Thorpey (or was it Hackett ?) ad with him swimming through mud. Anyway, I'm confident that I will finish the 10km next Sunday albiet very slowly. My splits were:- 7:32 1km 7:25 2km 7:19 3km 7:18 4km 7:28 5km 7:32 6km 7:57 7km 3:36 7.5km So based on that 7:30/km pace I should finish the race in about 75 mins. Mood: --->

No running to report. The next one will be in the morning when I tackle the sand again. I will aim to run 7.5km on the beach and make that my "longest run" before the 10km race next Sunday. I have entered Jackson & I in the Mother's Day Classic on the 13th of May and will do the 4km version around the Domain/Mrs Macquarie's Chair. The Bride & Maya will be walking the same distance. Jackson is really excited to run a race with his Dad. He has already ran the distance two weeks ago so our training on the weekend will start to focus on speed. Maybe some 30 sec efforts with running recovery as we run the path around Centennial. It will do me good too as I've been running like a slug for most of 07. ***************************** Fat Friday ! Weight last week: 82.1kg Weight this week: 81.0kg Comment: Running a marathon is a sure way of losing a kg or two. ***************************** Mood: --->

3km | soft sand I saw on the CR calendar that the Bondi Barefoot has been brought forward to 29 April this year. I have listed both this race and the Manly Soft Sand Classic in my to-do list for the past few years and always have a injury which prevents me from doing it (or maybe was just too lazy). Seeing as it's next week and I am (at the moment anyway) uninjured, I'm thinking that I might head down to Nth Bondi on Sunday week and give it a crack. There are two options. A 4km and 10km race. Seeing I usually do 5km in training, it seems pretty girly to do the 4km option, so I'll do the 10km one. It will no doubt be bloody hard, but the week after my first marathon I'm feeling pretty invisible invincible. So we'll run with it whilst the last drops of post race adrenaline remain in my veins. Last night I ran in the Nike Frees because I still have a few blister and manky toe issues from last Sunday to deal with. Running on the sand in the Frees was OK. I bought them to allow me to play on the sand through the winter when I feel the need (barefoot on the sand in the winter is impossible as it feels like your running on snow). My legs were pretty heavy doing the laps. The planned 5 laps quickly reverted to 3 after I pulled a heartledge muscle and thought it best not to push things. I am supposed to be in recovery mode afterall. In other news: seeing that my next goal race is the C2S, Fat Friday will be making an overdue return as I aim to lose several kgs of blubber before August. EDIT: Yes Lulu, I meant invincible but wrote invisble ! I'm sure that there is something deep and somewhat Freudian about that mistake. LOL *eek!* Mood: --->

42.2km | Race | 4:26:58 Well after snapping my soleus 8 weeks ago, seemingly always having some sort of a niggle to contend with and the chronic fatigue syndrome (read: virus I think) in the taper period, I was pretty stoked that I even made it to the start. To be honest, if I hadn't promised my mate CR Ripley to run it with him I'm sure (?) I would have pulled the pin. So with the assistance of 2 strong coffees, voltaren rapid and pseudoephedrine pre-race I was sufficiently doped up to get me to the start. I would have failed a random drug test for sure. LOL. I met up with CR Ripley (left) - my mate for 35 years since Primary School - who drove up from his farm in Jindera near Albury. He had been training with a bunch of other people from the Uni down there (Ripley is a lecturer) and being mentored by a guy called Peter who sadly died of cancer a few weeks ago. So yesterday the half a dozen in the squad all wore "For Pete's sake" singlets in his honor. After meeting up with a heap of CoolRunner and Striders at the start including Omni (right) who was doing the 50km, we set off at easy pace. After about 5km I asked Ripley if the pace was OK, he said that it was probably a bit slower than his training pace but at 6:00/km I thought it was about right. No need going out to hard when your heading into unknown territory I said. Along the way we met a heap of CoolRunners including Keg and Bob F who has run 180 odd marathons and Horrie tells me he even ran Sydney to Melbourne ! Bob was to pace the 4 hour group but did a hammy. Bob said that he was just going to tough it out and we left him running with his limp. We joke about it to ourselves that you'd have to be crazy to run a marathon with a torn hammy. He passed us about 39km mark and would have finished about 4:10 I reckon. If marathon running is mostly mental, the Bob F must have that part of it licked. Wow. The race coincided with the annual Balloon Fiesta and we were treated with a dozen or so balloons in the air in the early morning. I made a wonderful backdrop and there plenty of people who ventured out in the early morning to see the sights and cheer on the runners. Picture postcard stuff as they say. I took the pic of Mike from Monsters Inc movie (below) for the kids as I knew they would love to see a balloon from one of their favourite movies. We made it to the 10km mark bang on an hour and then crossed the lake for the first leg out to Black Mountain. Ripley & we just chatted and joked the whole way. Caught up on gossip and chatted to plenty of people. I was very impressed with the way that he drink stations were set up plenty of water bags, sponges and the important tub of vasso. It was the first time that I have ever used water bags, save one or two up at the Central Coast Half last year. Great stuff for mine. You always finish the bag and the spillage rate is next to none. I reckon the water bags were the reason why I had such a good day. At the 20km mark we were bang on 2 hours and running strong. We then came across CR Otter who was walk/running according the the Galloway principle. For the rest of the race Otter would surge ahead of us, then stop and walk. We'd run past him whilst walking, then he would run past etc. It was like the Tortoise and the Hare story. Not sure who got home first at the end. Perhaps he did. Might be something in the Galloway thing. Maybe for ultras or something I reckon. We were again on the 10km/hour rate at 30km running through the drink station bang on 3 hours. We took our second gel at that stage as we headed out to the Mountain for the second time. By then the winners were already well and truly finished and we had been treated to watching CR Uncle Dave (3rd)scoot past us under an hour ago as well as Martin Considene (4th?)who I know through Bronte Nippers. Not a great opportunity for chat with those guys apart from a quick g'day. Man can they run. Coming out of the tunnel at about 35km and up the short hill that follows the heat really started to effect us and Ripley started to get the wobbles a bit. We both grabbed and extra gel and a sponge as well. Our pace slowed considerably as we trudged across the bridge over the lake for the last time. Ripleys stride had shorted to a Cliff Young shuffle but to his credit he was determined not to walk one step of the 42.2km. I was feeling fine but feeling the heat all the same. The support from the volunteers and public in the last 5kms was awsome and made that little bit easier to get through the last few kms. At the 40km drink station the going was tough but I was determined that we finish strong. I was encouraging Ripley that we must finish strong and that it was only 2kms from home but his shuffle was slowing even more. I was feeling it mainly deep in the hips and the heat was intolerable at that point. We turned the corner with 800m to go and my kids and the Bride were on the sideline screaming my name. CR Tesso flew past us completing her 50km extension. Well done girl. I said you and I would finish at the same time ! Ripley and I ran down the finishing shute together as we started and crossed the line in 4:26ish. I was feeling great (adrenaline ?) however Ripley has to visit the first aid tent for a spell for bit of TLC because of a mild airways/asthma thing. He's fine now. So I did it. Ran my first marathon and crossed the finish line with a great mate. I couldn't ask for a better debut.

Mission accomplished ! Jackson at Start/Finish Jackson (8) & little sister Maya (5) in recovery area.

Week 18 of 18 After Striders on Saturday, Jackson & I headed out on Monday for a few kms to complete his last run before the Kids Marathon on Sunday morning. He is as ready as ever and I hope he enjoys the moment. I also hope that the Bride catches that moment on video as it will be a damn shame that I will not be there. Me ? I've had a sh!t week and have a long list of niggles too long to bore you with. Add to that the crappy flu that has left my head rotten & cloudy since Monday and you can see that the Running Gods are mighty unsympathetic with me right now. I did a creeky 6km Tuesday, 4km last night and will spin tonight I guess. Nonetheless, I'm looking forward to the weekend and aim to finish the bugger barring my leg falling off or something. Will to spend the next few days eating pasta, drinking water and generally being lazy (what's new!). Mood: --->

Week 17 of 18 Saturday 7th Apr 2007 10km | Sydney Striders Domain It was raining cats and dogs this morning and I ran today with the intention of rolling the legs over and not breaking anything. I hooked up with Ken (CR Lastish) at the start line and we ran at conversation pace for the entire course. I always like running with Ken and picked his brains about everything including next week's 42km effort. Finished in 55:XX and soaking wet. As I said, I have a few niggles and they held up ok. Ice and anti-inflams will get me to the start line next week. Nothing new there. Thursday 5th Apr 2007 5km | soft sand I saw Larry the Physio this afternoon. Just a last minute tune up before the big day. I have developed a few niggles and need to work on them over the next week. Ran on the sand after dinner. Same old stuff. Tuesday 3rd Apr 2007 5km | soft sand I ventured down to Bondi last night for a play in the sand pit. Whilst it's a hard slog in the sand, I find it very therapeutic for tired old muscles. A cool north-easterly kept me comfortable and made the going easy. My calves and quads were very tight and even sore to touch after Sunday's run. Last night allowed some blood to flow and after a long stretching session on the sand, I'm feeling almost normal.

Week 16 of 18 Sunday 1 April, 2007 I had to go into the office all day Sat and half day Sun. By the time I got home and then washed the car, I was tired and my brain was mashed potato. Uncle Hal said 19km. WTF ?? What happened to the freeking taper Hal ? Grrr. I headed out at 3.00pm and had Jackson dressed in his kit so I could run past at the end of my run and take him into the park. My legs were feeling good. All stress fractures had healed and even the ITB and achilles were content. I ran a lap around the park and fully intended to do another but basically got bored. So I took a detour down to Clovelly and ran the coastal path to Bondi and home. I found it really tough mentally to get through the run. The legs were strong but the mind was soft. Why I picked the coastal path with all those stairs and the long climb home up Bondi Road I have no idea. I finished in a tad under 2 hours and ran past home to pick up Jackson. I asked him if he wanted to run 2 or 3km today. How about 4km he said. Cripes - your gunna kill your old man ! So we did a whole lap of the walking path with only a brief stop at a bubbler. Very proud of him I was. More importantly, he was stoked with his achievement. Legs feel pretty good today. Thursday 29 Mar 07 9km - easy With stress fractures all healed except for the one on top of the right tibia, my only aches were a sore achilles, heel and ITB. Running down Old South Head Road hurt like hell. Running up Bondi Road pretty much the same. The only thing that got me through the run was the constant chant "I hate Hal Higdon, I hate Hal Higdon". Tuesday 27 Mar 07 5km - easy Had massive DOMS and creeky legs from the big 35km on the weekend. Felt like I had multiple stress fractures, muscle tears and anything else you could throw in to make the run crappier.