The hot cross bun run

3.30pm session: easy run
Distance: 14km
Time: 1hr 19.50min
Weather: 19.7*c, wind – W, 9kph; sunny, blue skies

I’m way over running in the twilight zone, ie running early in the dark, so I’m trying to plan the bulk of my runs to happen in daylight hours. So it was a nice sleep in this morning followed by a leisurely breakfast, a spot of housecleaning and washing, and then a coffee at Max Brenner’s.

Hmm, sometime today I’m going to have to get on my running gear and out the door. Today’s motivation – run the 14km and then I can have a hot cross bun when I get home. So hence today’s run being known as the hot cross bun run!

It was an absolutely stunner of an afternoon to be out running 14km – brilliant blue skies, not a cloud to be seen, a gentle breeze, not too hot, just perfect. Lots of other people thought so too as I passed many out walking their dogs, the occasional other runner and some cyclists.

Back home, I thoroughly enjoyed that toasted hot cross bun

The run that nearly didn’t happen

Today’s session: Speedy Geese session @ Yarralumla (5.08pm)

Distance: 10.3km
Time: 1hr 03:06min
Pace: 6.06min/km
Cals: 594
Weather: 26.4*c, wind – NE, 13kph

Sleeps to marathon: 34

If it wasn’t for a certain person, today would’ve ended up being a rest day. Why?

I decided to sleep in this morning and when I did eventually roll out of bed it was only to grab a coffee and some breakfast and then I headed back to bed to read.

Then I thought I’d run when I got back from the mall, but by then it was lunchtime so I decided to have some lunch and head out a little later.

In the meantime, the temperature was rising. It was quite warm outside.

Then there was a text from Ruth saying that she would make it to the Speedy Geese session tonight. Cool. Maybe I’d go. But then as the hours rolled by, and I was relaxing on the couch reading, any motivation I had to run just went *poof!* and evaporated. Ruth to the rescue! She’d offered to pick me up knowing full well I’d have no reason not to go. With friends like this…….

And so that was how I was at the run session tonight, running hard around an oval, trying to chase other runners down, and getting chased down myself in the process.

It very nearly didn’t happen but now that its done, I’m glad it did!

“What you do every day is more important than what you do once in a while.” – Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

Eye of the tiger

Session: early morning run (5.43am)

Distance: 14km
Time: 1hr 23.14min
Av pace: 5.52min/km
Cals: 872
Weather: 9*c, wind – N, 6kph so a cool but pleasant morning.

I was channelling Rocky on this morning’s run. Don’t ask me why. I didn’t wake up and think “It’s the eye of the tiger, its the thrill of the fight, risin’ up to the challenge of our rival…”, and punch the air before getting out of bed. I wasn’t even thinking Rocky when I started running.

But about halfway into the run, an image of Rocky running the streets in his trackies and hoodie popped up. Goodness knows why, it’s been years since I’ve seen the movie and its all a bit vague. Maybe I was feeling tired and it was feeling all a bit same old same old. But I remember when Rocky was running the streets as part of his training and of course the scene when he runs up the steps to the entrance of the Philadelphia Museum of Art to “Gonna Fly Now”. Which by the way makes a great running mantra – “trying hard now, it’s so hard now, trying hard now. Getting strong now, won’t be long now, getting strong now. Gonna fly now, flying high now, gonna fly, fly, fly.”

Well there was no running up steps this morning but the image of Rocky running the streets inspired me to hang in there and keep going. Gosh, I might’ve even done a couple of fist pumps just because…

Maybe I should download Eye of the Tiger or Gonna Fly Now to my iPod for inspiration.

“The world ain’t all sunshine & rainbows. It’s a very mean & nasty place, and I don’t care how tough you are, it will beat you to your knees & keep you there permanently if you let it. You, me or nobody is gonna hit as hard as life. But it ain’t about how hard you hit, it’s about how hard you can get hit & keep moving forward. How much you can take & keep moving forward. ‘Thats how winning is done’.” – Rocky

Lift

Morning session: run

Distance: 14km inc 3 x 7min (3min RI)
Time: 1hr 19min
Av pace: 5.38min/km
Cals: 810

I listen to music while out running. It helps to pass the time, take my mind off how I’m feeling (particularly in the latter stages of runs) and because I find music motivating. I set my iPod to shuffle mode as I enjoy the randomness of song selection. Yet it always surprises me how certain songs pop up at the most appropriate moment. There was a point when I was flagging this morning and starting to get into the dreaded plod mode when Lift by Shannon Noll came on. Perfect! Lift I did and consequently got my second wind to finish off the run strongly.

It was a good run overall. The swim yesterday proved to be a great recovery session and there were no niggles, aches or pains when running this morning. That’s always a bonus!

“Regardless of what you are or what you have been, you can still become what you may want to be.” – W. Clement Stone

Reach, rotate, pull, finish and repeat

This morning: swim

Session: 1.2km time trial (of sorts); 300m kickboard/fins
Time trial: 27.41min
Total distance: 1.5km

I had a plan mapped out for this morning’s swim but all that went out the window when I jumped into the water. Why, I don’t know, but once I had swum the first 300m I decided to continue for as long as I could before some obstruction ie another swimmer and usually someone doing breast stroke, meant I had to stop. What makes it even more surprising was that I was feeling incredibly tired (the first couple of hundred metres were awful – imagine swimming through mud) but around the 300m mark I slipped into comfortable stroke mode and then just concentrated on ‘reach, rotate, pull, finish the stroke and repeat”, a legacy of swim squad days.

Without me even really noticing I had swum 1km and then I made the decision to do another 100m, and then another 100m before stopping. Ok I wasn’t swimming at a blistering pace (I only have one swim speed and that is slow) but I was pretty pleased to keep going at a consistent pace, and pleasantly surprised I could swim that far without having to stop because of other swimmers. Yay!

Had a catchup and coffee with MT at lunchtime at my favourite coffee place (Two Before Ten). I was interested to hear how he went in the 12 hour run last weekend as well as pumping for information and advice on how to cope mentally with long runs – something that is a very real issue for me at the moment. So it was an enjoyable, as well as useful, catch up.

“If you realized how powerful your thoughts are, you would never think a negative thought.” – Peace Pilgrim

Don’t think, just do

Sometimes it pays not to think about what needs to be done but to just do it. I know, for me personally, I have a tendency to overthink my training program i.e., analysis paralysis. So today my motto was ‘don’t think, just do.’ Short and snappy and every time I noticed my mind starting to fixate on what training I had to do, when I was going to do it, and then the myriad of reasons why I can’t do it, I’d recall this motto.

Worked a treat!

This morning was a 1.3km swim session – my first for a week. It began with an easy 300m warm up followed by 6 x 50m at a slightly harder pace. Then I swam 6 x 50m with the pull buoy (we have become friends) followed by another 300m swim, again at a slightly harder pace. Finally I finished with a 100m cool down swim. It was a better session than I had initially thought, given I’m coming back from a week off due to illness.

Tomorrow: the plan is to run before work and then do a bike intervals session after work.

“It is more fun to talk with someone who doesn’t use long, difficult words but rather short, easy words like “What about lunch?” -  Pooh’s Little Instruction Book, inspired by A. A. Milne

 

The heat is on

29 Nov 2012_Luna park entrance, St Kilda

It was hot sweaty work doing my bike session this afternoon. It involved increasing intensity and resistance every 5 minutes for 20 minutes, then the next 2 minutes were at a high resistance and low RPM, followed by an 8 minute cool down. Not exactly what you want to be doing when its 30+ degree celsius outside. It would have been so easy to skip the session tonight but it got done.

This morning it was another weights session in a very quiet gym. Maybe everyone has started holidays early this year?!!

Tomorrow its forecast to be 36 degrees celsius so another hot day. It’s the departmental Xmas party lunch tomorrow and the theme is Sideshow Alley. Our team is going as the ‘Sitting Ducks’ (ie target practice) which pretty much describes how we feel in the current environment! However I will be leaving early as I have a hairdressers appointment – yay!

Tomorrow: the plan is to do a swim session of 1.8km. I may appreciate this session if it doesn’t cool down overnight.

“Genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration.” ~Thomas Edison

Celebrate ALL achievements

Warning! A rant ahead……..

I believe we should be cheering on, supporting, celebrating everyone’s achievements when it comes to all things fitness. Whether it be running 5, 10, 21, 42 or 100km, achieving a PB at crossfit, doing week 3 of Couch to 5km, doing a triathlon (whether it be a sprint distance, HIM or IM and everything in between), Pilates, whatever. Lately I’ve been reading or hearing of mean spiritness and a misguided sense of  athletic superiority eg only an ultra is considered ‘real’ running etc and this saddens me. It saddens me because why can’t we just celebrate any type of athletic endeavour, acknowledge and applaud the effort that each individual puts into their chosen activity. Given the troubling statistics showing rates of  increasing obesity, with more and more people being sedentary and suffering lifestyle diseases such as heart disease, type 2 diabetes, various cancers, etc, I think we should be applauding anyone who gets out there and makes a difference in their own lives, regardless of what the activity is. Not everyone can be an elite athlete, or even a good athlete (whatever that means) but, in all honesty, it’s the effort that counts.

And please when someone responds to what you may have written about your training or the doubts that you might be feeling in respect of an event you are training for, by telling you that you will be awesome, don’t shoot them down for saying that, in some misguided belief that its putting pressure on that person. You know what, I am awesome! 12 months ago I was just starting out running again having most of last year off due to a torn hamstring, and now fast forward to the present and I am just over 2 weeks away from competing in a half Ironman triathlon, yes I believe I am awesome. Awesome for giving it a shot, for training my butt off for the past 5 1/2 months, and at least giving it a go.  It won’t be a fast time, I won’t qualify for anything, but having a BHAG has got me off my butt and motivated to do something that not a lot of people will do. It doesn’t make me superior to others, it doesn’t make me a ‘real’ triathlete or athlete, but that’s not the point of doing something like this. I wanted to see if I could do this, for me, nobody else.

So please, applaud the achievements of everyone who is out there keeping fit, training for events, just starting out on the road to fitness, returning from injury. Everyone is a champion. Celebrate your awesomeness – no-one can take that away from you

Ok, rant over…….back to my training program and tonight I celebrated my awesomeness by doing the second of my bike interval sessions. As part of this session there were 4 big hills – well, virtual ones! I had 4 x 10min in a moderate-hard gear so I visualised cycling up long hills. This was hot sweaty work which was no mean feat given that my wind trainer is outdoors, in the carport. The rain was pouring down outside, at least I was under cover but it wasn’t exactly warm (well not until I warmed up on the bike and then I was hot!).

Tomorrow: the plan is a 2.4km swim session before work.

“Life is a journey, not a destination.” ― Ralph Waldo Emerson

ps WordPress is playing up at the moment and I can’t post a photo – will try again tomorrow

My favourite day

The following is so true, and I have to remember this especially when I’m doing one of my more challenging work outs or heavy training weeks. Persistence does pay off in the end.

Practice persistence

“The most valuable experiences are often the most difficult
experiences. The biggest challenges bring out the best in
you, and compel you to make your best even better.

Difficult situations are not much fun. Yet by working your
way through them, you create great strength and value.

Even when your hard work is not fully appreciated or
immediately rewarded, it still brings important value to
your life. The experience of dealing with challenge can
produce a lifetime of beneficial dividends.

When you know you have done it in the past, you also know
you can do it again. That is the essence of true confidence.

The difficult experiences give you the opportunity to
practice persistence. And persistence is a quality that is
always in demand.

Though your efforts may not pay off immediately, they will
pay off. Persist, and know that you are growing stronger and
stronger. “ – Ralph Marston, 2012

Today was a great day. A rest day (yay!) which included a sleep in, work until lunchtime, lunch with a friend who had baked a delicious chocolate flourless cake (it was so moreish that I had to resist taking extra home because honestly I could’ve eaten the entire cake it was that good), and then the hairdressers.

What is your favourite day?

Tomorrow: the plan is to rise and shine early and ride for 3.5 hours followed by a 20 minute interval run. Following this I have a well-earned and much-anticipated massage.

“I want to stand as close to the edge as I can without going over. Out on the edge you see all the kinds of things you can’t see from the centre.”- Kurt Vonnegut, American novelist

 

 

Oh my…..

When my new training program arrived in my in-box last night I quickly opened it, scanned the contents and got an inkling of what was in store for me. Then I closed it – no need to scare myself before bed. Today, I have been sitting looking at my just-printed training program for the next 4 weeks and its slowly starting to sink in – the next 3 weeks are going to involve a lot of hard work. I know that if I get through these next few weeks that I will be able to complete a half Ironman triathlon. Which is the whole point of it really, isn’t it. It’s just seeing it on paper and knowing what it will entail is just slightly frightening and a tad bit overwhelming at the moment. However I also know it will be a case of suck it up and just do it. It’s just every now and then I suffer the self doubts – can I do this?…what if I can’t do this?…..maybe I’m getting too old for this stuff………maybe I really suck at this…..those sort of self doubts.

And because I have a long hilly ride (with an emphasis on hilly in case I missed it!) scheduled for this coming Saturday last night I dreamt I cycled Coppins Crossing and every other hilly road in Canberra last night. No wonder I was tired when I woke this morning! But I bet that doesn’t count as training although visualisation is a useful technique and is meant to be as good as the real thing (I know, I’m clutching at straws. Coach says that dreaming of hill riding counts as ADDITIONAL training whereas I was hoping INSTEAD OF!)

Anyway, it was off to the gym for a weights session this morning, after a much-appreciated, and fortifying, black coffee (well, you try cycling every hilly road in Canberra overnight in your sleep!). I have noticed my leg strength has improved a lot – the leg press, lunges and hamstring curls were done with increased weights. Can’t say the same for push ups and triceps push ups though – they never seem to get any easier. However I also felt the improvement when doing seated cable rows and standing shoulder presses with a barbell – it must be all that swimming. Its gotta be good for something other than avoiding drowning.

And tonight I completed the first of 2 intervals sessions for the week on the bike. No problems to report, just tired legs;)

Tomorrow: the plan is to swim again and, maybe, go for a run at lunchtime. I’ll make up my mind about the run tomorrow…..no pressure.

“You must remain focused on your journey to greatness.” – Les Brown