Fifth

I’d packed my gear to head in for a swim this morning, so set the alarm for 5am. I woke up prior to the alarm going off and heard the wind and rain and decided that an extra hour and a half in bed seemed like a better idea. What a wimp eh?

The full race results were posted on the web today for Sunday’s Run Melbourne. I was happy with my PB time, but even happier to see I’d come 123rd (out of 3,558) overall, and 5th (out of 105) in my age group. Even considering that lots of the entrants are slower walkers, finishing in the top 4 or 5% is better than I normally do.

A relaxing home workout tonight with lots of self massage using my new physio roller, stretching as well as some core exercises and upper body free weights. All this accompanied by The Angels Live turned up nice and loud.

Monthly Summary

Running: 72 kms at 5:31 min/km (YTD 344 kms at 5:41 min/km)
Cycling: 196 kms at 23.2 kms/hr (YTD 2130 kms at 25.0 kms/hr)
Other: 3 swims and 18 home workouts

The most home workouts in a month since my training journal began, so feeling happy about that as the strength training and stretching has always been a weakness for me. Definitely spurred on by my realisation that I have to do this stuff to remain injury free. Amazing how a longish term injury can make you finally realise what is important.

No time …

No time for a long post tonight. I started playing Scrabble on Facebook and 3 hours seems to have passed!

A 20km easy ride tonight before darkness stopped me.

Run Melbourne 5km

Today was the Run Melbourne 5km race that I’d originally planned to run with Chris, but due to his ankle injury, was now running with workmate Voj. It was a 10am start, so no need for a really early alarm which was appreciated. As usual I was pretty organised, up, showered, breakfasted and ready to go too early. My knees felt pretty good, and a liberal lathering of Extra Strength Deep Heat warmed them up nicely. I parked at the RACV Club and walked down to meet Voj in Fed Square. He was 20 minutes later than our agreed time, but we still got to the start area with plenty of time to spare.

Pretty soon we were away and the first 500m was just pretty much run with the crowd. I have to admit as I ran up the hill towards the end of the first kilometre I started to think that I was going to struggle, but at the 1km marker the watch showed 4:46, just over the pace I was aiming at. The hill just before the Anderson St descent tested me too, and the pace slowed, but the 2km marker showed that I’d picked up the pace by a whole 1 second.

Going down the Anderson St hill I lost Voj. I wasn’t sprinting down the hill as some were, because it kills my knees, so I wasn’t actually sure if I’d lost Voj behind or if he’d gone ahead (I found out later he stopped to tie a shoelace).

When the Garmin beeped for 3km, and I saw I’d run that kilometer in 4:30 I started to think that I was going okay. The undulations as we ran across the Rod Laver footbridge and the William Barak Bridge felt tough but I managed to sustain the pace pretty well, finishing the last two kilometres in 4:33 and 4:34 respectively.

So, splits of 4:46, 4:45. 4:30, 4:33 & 4:34, for an unofficial time of 23:17, an average pace of 4:38 min/km and a new 5km PB by approximately 50 seconds depending on the official time.

Even though this is probably still a bit of a soft 5km PB, given my recent preparation, and the fact that a few days ago I wasn’t sure if I’d make the run, it is a result I’m really pleased with.

Voj came in a few minutes behind me, we got through the very efficiently manned race goodies stations and headed up to The Transport for a pint!

Knees are feeling okay, I’m sitting here in my Skins watching Geelong vs Port Adelaide.

Edit: 25km “recovery ride” on the bike just finished.

Edit: Just got the SMS from Start To Finish, official time 23:15, PB by 48 seconds.

New kit

Victoria Market as normal to start the day off, then after lunch I went back into the city on my own to spend some birthday money. I managed to deplete my Rebel Sport gift cards to almost a zero balance with a new pair of Skins long tights and a new pair of Thorlo running socks. I tried on some 2XU compression tights, and deliberated for a while over them vs Skins, but in the end decided to stick to what I know seems to work for me and bought the Skins. So, it’ll be nice to have some new kit for tomorrows race, but pity Rebel Sport don’t sell new knees, because I think mine are going to make tomorrows 5km just a bit of a jaunt, rather than a PB assault, but I’ll see how they feel in the morning. I’m running it with Voj (workmate) who has stepped in for Chris whose ankle is still not recovered enough to run unfortunately.

An easy 18km on the bike this afternoon just to keep the legs moving. It seems to help my knees a bit, more so than sitting around anyway.

74.7kg this morning, so weight is pretty steady.

Good luck to everyone else running tomorrow, especially those running their first half marathon – the feeling as you cross that finish line will be wonderful – enjoy it!

RIP Farrah

I was sad to hear that Farrah Fawcett lost her battle with cancer overnight. As a teenager I was a huge fan of Charlie’s Angels and loved her as Jill Munroe. The picture above was originally published in Time magazine and is the biggest selling pin-up poster of all time.

Rest in peace, Farrah.

Today was my day-off and Adrienne and I went up to Bendigo to see the 2009 Archibald Prize finalists which were on display at the Bendigo Art Gallery. My favourite (by a long way) and also the People’s Choice winner was Vincent Fantauzzo’s portrait of Brandon Walters (the young aboriginal actor who played opposite Nicole Kidman in Australia). It was a stunning portrait over 2 metres wide, so life-like it almost seemed to speak to you. I’m not sure what the judges were thinking not giving it the 2009 Archibald Prize – it was clearly the best entry (IMHO).

We had a lovely lunch at the Bendigo Gallery cafe (I had a chicken, cashew, pumpkin and cherry tomato rissotto which was beautiful), then had a walk around the Bendigo city centre. On the way home we stopped at the Rebel sport and I got a foam roller (been looking locally all week, unsuccessfully), so I can start doing some of the massage exercises physio Katrina wants me to do. We stopped at Malmsbury for coffee and cake on the way home (Malmsbury is one of our favourite little spots – it seemed wrong to drive past!).

I decided that a gentle bike ride might be the best thing for the knees, and managed 25km in just under an hour before darkness set in. The knee is still sore, but improved over yesterday.

Now the good knee’s gone bad !

Bugger. Really sore knee today, sore behind the knee. Stupid thing is it is my “good” knee, not the one that has been troubling me most recently.

So, today is rest, I’ve just taken an anti-inflam and have cancelled my scheduled run with Deb tomorrow.

Doesn’t auger well for Sunday’s race.

Evacuate …. aahhh

Firstly an update on the water situation from yesterday. Yarra Valley Water have spoken to Adrienne today and are now saying they had nobody in the area yesterday and nobody authorised to do any work on the fire hydrant. Current theory is that it was someone stealing water. We’ve rung manufacturer of the hot water service today but haven’t had a call back. Hot water is a lot clearer today, but we’re still concerned about what sediment is now in the hot water service.

I headed in for a run before work with Deb again this morning. We completed the same 8.2km loop as the last few times, but about 10 secs/km faster than the last one (5:30 min/km).

Then it got interesting. When I was in the shower at work, the building evacuation alarm went off. The “get out immediately” one. Not wanting to be out there in nothing but my towel, and figuring it would be a false alarm like last time, I got dry and dressed as quickly as possible and proceeded outside to the meeting point. With still wet hair, and not dried 100%, standing around outside was a chilling experience. Later in the day I found out they now think it was me that caused it. Well, they think they need to replace the sensor in the shower room because they think the steam is setting off the alarm.

The next highlight of the day was the hosting of an “Australia’s Biggest Morning Tea”. For those who haven’t heard of this it is a fundraising activity for cancer research where you make a donation in return for a cup of tea. Management had been asked to volunteer to serve everyone, so I was there resplendent in my Winnie-the-Pooh apron. Good fun for a good cause!

A cut-short home workout tonight – cut short because I ran out of enthusiasm I’m afraid to say.

A new car …

Well, not quite, but I did pick my car up from the panel beaters today … and it looks just like a new one … all damage expertly repaired and the car washed and detailed. I’ve been lucky enough to have had the lend of a car from work, but there’s nothing quite like driving your own car. It’s nice to have it back.

We’re a bit annoyed with our water supplier (Yarra Valley Water if you’re interested). We got a phone call tonight from our next door neighbour asking us to check if our water was all brown. Sure enough, when we checked it was. Our neighbour had rung the water supplier, who’d told her they had doen some work on a fire hydrant in our street today. The instructions that the water supplier had given our neighbour was to run the back garden tap for a few minutes to flush out the dirty water, which we did. It seemed such a waste of water though, especially as it was peeing down with rain at the time! Anyway, that fixed the cold water, but our hot water is still discoloured. Our fear is that, because we weren’t notified of the work being done, that we’ve inadvertently run the crappy water into our hot water service – not sure what damage that will have done, but it doesn’t seem to want to run clear. Ringing Yarra Valley Water didn’t help much – they say they have no responsibility for hot water, just cold. Adrienne couldn’t seem to get it through to them that it was their cold water that feeds the hot water service. Anyway, no supervisor / manager there to speak to so we have requested a call back tomorrow. In the mean time, the electric kettle is getting a work out.

Just a home workout tonight.

A noisy start to the day …

I had arranged to meet Deb for a 6:45am run from work this morning, so was up nice and early. I didn’t feel like breakfast, still feeling full from yesterday, so a very rare occurrence for me – a day without breakfast. When going for a run I need to take my sports bag, my work clothes on a hanger, as well as my laptop and briefcase. So, I decided to make two trips out to the car. I unlocked the boot from inside the house (can hear it click open as the car is parked only a few feet from our bedroom window), chucked the keys on the bed and headed out with the first load of bags. Now, I’m currently driving a loaner car from work as mine is in the panel beaters, and what I didn’t realise was that this one doesn’t turn off the alarm when you open the boot with the remote like mine does. So, I’m outside, open the boot, the car alarm goes off and the keys are inside. Racing inside, I find poor Adrienne bolt upright in bed wondering what the hell is going on. Oops, sorry about that!

Anyway a great run, the same 8km loop as last week, but a couple of seconds/km faster (5:40 min/km). Not as foggy as last week, but there was a bit of fog laying around on the ground, but only about knee height, it looked a bit surreal actually.

After work a refreshing 23km on the bike at just over 25 km/hr average speed, just around the local streets. Then, after tea (leftovers, of course) a short home workout.

Birthday celebrations !

Dual birthday celebrations today, much merriment and fun had by all. Whilst I was good on the “not having too much to drink” side, I did eat far, far too much. There were so many wonderful things at each course, lots of lovely dips (including one smoked salmon one that Adrienne made which was my favourite), then lots of barbecue goodies with salads, then my favourite – the desserts (pavlovas, baked cheescake, rocky road, cookies and cream ice cream, cupcakes, mars bar slice, blueberry teacake – and that was just the ones I tried).

Also, an exercise free weekend – haven’t had one of those for a while – I’ve got a bit of making up to do this week I think.

I have a new favourite beer – Cascade First Harvest. It is a limited edition one that is made from the first harvested hops, and therefore only available for a short period each year. I tried it at the brewery tour earlier in the year, and saw some in Dan Murphy on Saturday. Expensive, but worth it.

I also bought my Tour De France Guide today – I think this is my favourite magazine of the year, so packed full of good stuff (I even like the ads) – and a sure sign that there are some sleepless nights approaching soon.