Snuck up on me

Got a bit of a surprise last night when I was examining the entrails of my training week - my 3rd biggest week ever, and the biggest since before Canberra 2006. Why the surprise? Because I don't see what I'm doing now as being a slog like those pre-Canberra weeks were. [start kevin07 mode] Am I tired? Yep. Am I a bit niggley? Yep. But am I still raring to get out and run? You betcha! [end kevin07 mode].

As the last 4 weeks have all been relatively high km (by my standards anyhow - 59, 54, 58, 69), I've forced myself to have a down week this week. Normally that would mean halving every run, but this time I'm doing it a bit differently. I'll do TA's scheduled run with her tomorrow, nothing(!!??) on Wednesday, Run Club Christmas (which is more 'Christmas' than 'run') on Thursday and nothing on Friday. Then it's back to normal with the Strider's 6ft training group on Saturday and a leisurely(!!) lap of Quarry Rd with TA on Sunday morning (her first). Let's see how that goes to settle the aches and pains. :-)

This last weekend was fun (in a Masochistic kind of way :-) ). On Saturday, TA had to train bright & early as she was filling in for her boss through the day, and I had two laps of Quarry Rd with the 6ft Group. Quarry Rd is a strange and fantastical beast, a bit like our cat really. It lies there calmly, letting you pat it and thinking that you're in control of the situation, when suddenly it just lets fly with a claw or two and next thing you know you're a bloody mess... I've run one and a half laps quite a few times, but I've only done two-lappers twice. Both times I've got to the far end the second time thinking that everything was sweet, and both times I've totally died on the last hill. On Saturday, I even paused twice on some of the steeper sections because my glutes just didn't want to push any more! If that's what happens on a 26k run, how am I going to cope with 46? These and other questions might get answered in less than 12 weeks :-)

On Sunday, I introduced TA to the joys of SMC. It seemed like a relatively cool morning, but somehow smiffo lived up to its reputation and grew more humid as the morning wore on. Our aim was to run the 10k as TA's long run, so no racing allowed. The longer we went, the better TA felt, and it turned into one of those really pleasurable runs. We were aiming for around 60:xx and landed on 60:37. Funny thing was, TA was only 30 seconds behind her category leader! Next time she'll have to aim for 59:xx :-)

...and so into the 'easy' week. Will I have to discipline to stick with it?? Tune in next week and find out...

Gnome

Almost the end...

...of the year, and the last major race (CC Half, today). As I've mentioned before, things are gradually coming back together and I'm very happy that my last 5k, 10k & HM races have all produced season PBs. Today's time was not only a season pb, but also my second fastest time ever. Still 5 minutes over last year's magical mark, but I'm still pretty damn happy :-)

Tiger angel's taper for the 9k comprised glute-trashing sessions on Thursday night and Saturday morning, so she was already amongst the walking wounded before she even started. She was only supposed to be taking it easy, but I'm not sure that 'easy' is a word in her vocabulary, so the glutes are even more trashed tonight. In fact, we're both walking around like a couple of old crocks. (As an aside, I was talking to a friend last week who asked me "what does it feel like to be fit? Do you sleep better? Walk with a spring in your step?". I had to be honest. "Nup" I said, "I'm tired and I ache all the time!". Not much of an advertisement, am I? :-) :-)

Johnny Dark & I had a very similar race to hers, I think. Both very even (although JD & I averaged 4:25s for the first 5 k and were averaging 4:45s by the last 5, so we were steady, but getting steadily slower) and both pretty tough. I noticed in the early stages that we were doing 4:25s, so I guess that I should have slowed down then, because there was no way that either of us were going to keep that pace up for 21k. Still, hope springs eternal I guess. :-)

I went anaerobic at about 12k, so everything from there was pretty uncomfortable. There were so many times that I just wanted to drop off the pace, but there was JD running along strongly beside me. At the same time, he said a number of times to "go on ahead if I drop off. I'm at my limit". I think that if the truth be known, neither of us wanted to let the other one down, and so we ran on... 95:59 :-)

Gnome