Remember That Night

Had a fairly lazy day today, no exercise again.

I did find a new David Glimour DVD called “Remember That Night – David Gilmour Live at the Albert Hall” at JB HiFi. It contains a live version of all of his newest “On An Island” album and lots of other Pink Floyd stuff, including a great live version of “Echoes” a song not often seen performed live. Guest appearances from David Bowie, David Crosby and Graham Nash too. Double DVD set with heaps of other live tracks, music videos and other special features – over 5 hours in total. So, any other Floyd fans out there – go get a copy!

Monthly Summary

Running: 179 kms (1390 kms YTD), 12 runs only, but some longer ones than usual
Bike: 53 kms (1552 kms YTD), only 2 rides this month
Races: Spring Into Shape 1
Excuses: Some calf tightness, a head cold and a few other interruptions limited training
Outlook: Well, the Melbourne Marathon of course!

A purr..fect finish to a wonderful season!

Geelong 24.19 (163) defeated Port Adelaide 6.8 (44)

Well, that says it all really doesn’t it – what a dominant performance it was today – finishing of what has been the most amazing performance from Geelong in 2007;

• Minor premiers (top of the ladder finish after hitting top spot in round 11 and never losing it, and including 15 wins in a row)
• NAB Rising Star – Joel Selwood
• Nine Geelong players selected in the All-Australian team
• Brownlow medal winner – Jimmy Bartel
• VFL Premiers
• AFL Premiers with a record winning margin of 119 points
• Norm Smith medal winner – Steve Johnson

I still can’t believe it actually – as I wasn’t in Australia in 1963, I have never seen Geelong win a premiership – it is still a bit hard to take in. It was great to enjoy the match with mum and dad after all the trials of the last few weeks. The Geelong domination obviously removed the stress and we did enjoy the game! I have to admit that there were a few tears shed at the end of the game – I didn’t think I was that passionate about my footy team, but apparently I am!

We drove home past Kardinia Park (sorry Skilled Stadium) and the place was going off! I had my Geelong streamers out the window and everyone was shouting and beeping horns – it was a hoot.

Only downside today was that even after a big barbeque lunch I grazed on lollies, biscuits & cake etc the whole afternoon – can I call that some early carbo-loading?

Go Cats!

My last Friday off :-(

Today was the last of my Friday’s off work – it is going to be so hard going back to working 5 days next week!

We went down to the Victoria Market first thing, as we won’t be able to go tomorrow because we are heading down to Geelong.

After that we went over to Highpoint to do a bit of shopping. I wanted a new pair of Thorlo socks for the marathon next weekend, as most of mine are wearing a bit. I got some in the Amart Sports store at Highpoint for $15 (nearly half price), so I bought two pairs.

We also bought a present for my mum and dad. We got them a Nintendo DS and a couple of games. I’m hoping they will like it. We’ve been a bit worried about mum’s memory recently, and we brought a game called Brain Trainer. I’ve read some research about it and it says that it can really help people to keep their brains active and slow down the inevitable loss of function that old age brings – that is of course if they like it and use it. I’m not so worried about Dad he has had a couple of simple electronic handheld games over the years and likes them, so I think he will appreciate it. If they do like it, it also gives us another possibility for future birthday and Christmas presents – just get them another game!

I did my 15km run I’d planned this afternoon in the light rain and howling wind. I nearly didn’t go out, but thought to myself it could easily be like this Sunday week, so get out and do it! I headed out on my normal 8km loop, but when I hit the 7.5km mark, I turned around and went back in the reverse direction. I nearly weakened and said just keep going another 0.5km and be happy with 8km for the night, but I was strong and turned around and did the 15km. Taking notice of John’s advice from a few days ago, I put some slower music on the iPod to see how I went – my run tonight was just me and Katie Melua (she has the voice of an angel). I think I will take John’s advice and plan a marathon playlist with some slower stuff at the start, graduating to faster stuff at the end. The run tonight was 15km in 1 hour 22 minutes, an average 5:28 min/km pace.

13,000th hit on the blog today!

10 days to go!

Ten days to go until the big day. It is fast approaching and I am feeling strangely relaxed about it all. This is surprising me as I thought I would be getting quite nervous by now, I am sure it will all change in a few days time!

I had a massage tonight after work and I wasn’t anywhere as tight as normal, probably due to the slightly lower running load over the last week. I haven’t run for the last two days, really due to the lack of time, not an intentional start of the taper. After the massages, my legs have been feeling really great, so I am thankful to those of you who suggested it to me. I am booked in already for next Thursday too.

Had an interesting conversation with my masseur about the women we used to think were sexy on TV back when we were young. Here are some of my picks; Dianna Rigg (Emma Peel on the original Avengers – my favourite), Lynda Carter (Wonder Woman), Lindsay Wagner (Bionic Woman), all of the original Charlie’s Angels, Shirley Jones (the mum on The Partridge Family), Marcia from the Brady Bunch (did you see the latest story about her – not going to get into that here though). We decided that we thought the women back then were “sexier” than nowadays, because things were more subtle and mysterious than they are now. We decided though, that of the current crop, we both fancied Victoria from “It’s Me or the Dog” – just mentioned that tonight and my son thinks I’m nuts – oh well, each to their own, I guess.

I think I will try and do a 15km or so run either tomorrow or Saturday, and then limit myself to a couple of short runs (5-6 kms?) until the big day. I’m not sure how many days out I want to stop running altogether, but will not run for the two days prior at least. Any recommendations on this from anyone would be appreciated.

Clarkey has been organising a pasta meal the night before the marathon with some of the Saturday running group and I’d love to go, but I think it would be wiser for me to stick with “known”, home cooked meals the couple of days before, so I think I’ll give it a miss. Also want to overdose on sleep as well the few days before.

The girls had a solid win last night by about 30 points. One of the ladies in the opposition team used to coach in our basketball club so that added some interest!

Work has been okay the last couple of days, although still busy. We are preparing for an office refurbishment and have been instructed to have a huge clean-up. There is something quite refreshing and renewing about throwing stuff out, and it is amazing how much rubbish people keep (including me).

Congratulations to Jimmy Bartel

 

Sorry to those of you who are getting sick of the Geelong Football Club theme of this blog over the last few days, but I have to say congratulations to Jimmy Bartel in winning the 2007 Brownlow medal last night. A great little player and a very worthy winner.

Have to say though, it is possibly the most boring show on TV all year – we were watching other things and just flicking across in the ads until towards the end. What about Californication then, isn’t that a great little show – a lot of people are complaining about the sexual side of it, but I think the characters are great, and Hank is really a very sad character.

A shorter, slow run tonight – plan was to try and run at about my marathon pace – ended up being 8.5km at 5:45 min / km pace.

A lazy day at work and an enjoyable run

Had a bit of a lazy day at work today which was good. A young married couple who both work in IT in our USA office were in Australia on holiday for a wedding in Sydney. They decided they’d like to visit Melbourne and visit the facility, meet a few people etc. So I picked them up from the airport, gave them a bit of a facility tour, took them out to lunch, then drove them into the city. Much nicer than working!

A great run tonight too. I set myself a goal of doing a 10km at 5 min/km pace and achieved this (completing the 10km in 49:40), then walked the remaining 0.5km home to cool down.

Good luck to the Geelong boys in the Brownlow tonight – my only fear is that there will be so many Geelong players voting well, they’ll take the votes off each other and someone else will sneak in and win the medal!

One premiership down, one to go!

I’m happy to report that my dad is further improved and actually came home from hospital today. My brother and I are still a little concerned whether mum and dad are quite up to looking after themselves at the moment, but they say they are, so I guess we’ll just have to keep as close an eye on them as we can from Melbourne!

I spent this afternoon with dad watching the Geelong VFL side demolish Coburg (sorry Frankie and TigerBoy). Hopefully this is an omen for next weekend! Perhaps the best story of the day though was seeing Tom Lonergan have an almost B.O.G. performance including 5 goals in the 3rd quarter. For those of you that don’t follow footy, or Geelong, as closely, Tom lost a kidney a while back and most never thought he would play footy again. Fantastic to see him back out there and performing so well.

No exercise today.

I’m reading your blogs guys, but am struggling to find the time to comment, sorry – will do so when I get back to normal.

Go Cats!

Firstly, I’m happy to report my dad continues to improve and may even be allowed home from hospital soon, which is a great relief to all of us – thanks for your kind thoughts. My brother was down in Geelong today, so we had a fairly normal day at home, including a trip to the Vic Market. We will head down to Geelong again tomorrow.

 

Secondly, a very stressful night last night watching the footy – those ‘Pies wouldn’t give up would they – but a great fighting victory to the mighty Cats in the end. I just hope we can topple the Power next week, they looked good today, but then again they didn’t beat the Kangaroos by as much as we did a couple of weeks ago.

I had a good run this afternoon. I missed the Start2Finish training run this morning and knew I needed to do at least a medium length run. I decided to run “away” for an hour at a comfortable pace, then turn around and run back, and try and do a negative split, that is get back in less than an hour. I headed out towards Broadmeadows / Glenroy along the bike track and turned around after the hour at just under 11km. I had decided I’d also test myself out again on the Powerbar sports drink that is being served at the Melbourne Marathon, so made some of that up and wore the Fuel Belt. I stopped and walked 100m every 2.5km and had a few mouthfuls of Powerbar, and seem to have tolerated it well, no problems at all. I was also trying out my modified “marathon playlist” which is just my normal playlist stripped down to only include the really “up beat” songs.

After the turn-around I picked up the pace a little bit and it continued to feel pretty good, I was pretty pleased to complete the return 11km in 58 minutes and 10 seconds so I achieved the negative split. The whole trip was a smidge under 22km at 5:23 min/km pace.

Another Ausrunner got a mention in the latest R4YL mag, Tigerboy was mentioned in the Bellerine Rail Trail race report.

A quick post

Just a quick post to say thanks for all your kind thoughts for my Dad. Although we don’t have any real “diagnosis” yet, he is showing signs of improvement.

No runs (or any other exercise for that matter) for me, but I am getting to know the Melbourne-Geelong Road pretty well – not that I didn’t already!

BTW, did you all see Em had a letter published in the latest R4YL mag!

A few distressing days …

I haven’t been on-line for the last few days because I’ve been down in Geelong with my mum because my dad is in hospital. He was taken into hospital by ambulance on Monday morning. We still don’t really know what is wrong (still doing tests) but it does involve some internal bleeding which is never a good thing. The worse aspect of it all though is the mental affect it has had on him. He is suffering what they call deleriums and is not my dad at all – it has been very distressing.  We are told that this is often caused by blood loss and internal bleeding and are hopeful that it will pass and is not anything permanent. My mum was really distressed too and needed some support. My brother has gone down today and I will have a couple of days at home and go back down on Friday.

Went for my first run this afternoon since Sunday’s SiS race, and it was so great. After the going’s on of the last few days it felt so good to be out running with a bit of rain on my face. It was only just over 9km at 5:35 pace, but I think it did me the world of good. I was pretty wet and cold when I got home though, and given that I still have a few sniffles I hope it wasn’t a silly thing to do.

The official SiS results had me 10th (out of 49) in my age group, 53rd (out of 233) in the men and 69th (out of 744) overall. I’m pretty happy with that.