Training Log Archive: Sanders

Run with the cockies from devil's place (Devil, GrantM, ALJ, Mace, Catherine, Miss Jones) on Bruce and O'Connor Ridges. Great fun, especially all the single tracks which tested my ability to run and talk at the same time (not as good as GrantM in that respect). Yummy British soup and cake after made it another fun Wednesday night.

Usual Tuesday Bilbys. I did the long set of 8 x 800m. Felt quite good by the end. Splits: 3'38, 3'31, 3'33, 3'31, 3'29, 3'35, 3'33, 3'27.

Ran round bits of black mountain at lunchtime - great day for it, and heaps of people out and about. Tried to surge the hills. Felt good for doing a solid training run on a Monday, it's a good start to the week.

Foxlow Flat O. I did Red 2. Had lots of fun out there, it's such a great area. Was a bit slow round the erosion gullies, but otherwise happy with route choice and having a good attackpoint to each control. Powered round fairly well apart from the tussocky grass at the end - that seemed to really slow me down! A good day. And fun to have lots of other girls doing the same course to keep the pressure on to make me run fast. Sausages and choc chip cookies also a highlight at the end :)

Saturday XC at Carrum Brae, Symonston
Didn't feel as sharp as the 10K last weekend, which showed in my time - 30sec slower than last year. Will have to up the training I think, everyone is running heaps faster this year except for me! Good fun, though, enjoyed the sunny day, and managed to get ahead of a girl who usually beats me in half maras and longer races. Good company with lots of orienteers there too.

hmmm probably shouldn't have gone tonight - arrived late so missed all the stretches, and was too stressed/tired/worked up/worn out to give it a real go, so just ran round the track for half an hour. Gary said I was "good for listening to my body" which was a positive spin on it I suppose.

run with the cockies from lucy's with lucy, shannon, mace, al, devil and grantm. We ran up to Ainslie then around some of the fire trails. Good to catch up after a super busy day today - glad it was an easy run!

Bilbys long set of 6 x 1km with 200 easy. I felt really good, so was able to run hard round all the 6 K's, which was surprising because I felt a bit flat running in the warmup.
1K splits were 4'32, 4'29, 4'23, 4'16, 4'10, 4'21. The last one was a bit longer because there was a dog running on the track and I had to slow down briefly.
Great fun to catch up with everyone (bilbys and cockies and a stinger). All the orienteers were running well especially RichardH - I couldn't catch him round the final bend.

Tired legs today - hadn't intended training but had to go back to work after hours, so jogged back to work around 6:30pm for a few mins just to get some fresh air, then home again. Good to have a rest day.

Terry Fox fun run at the Canada High Commission.
Hadn't done this run for several years and was looking forward to it today because I knew lots of cockies would be there. I was feeling really good and it was such a nice day for it I knew I would have fun even if I didn't run well. However, I was fairly sprightly right from the start, doing my first km in 3'53 (glad I was wearing my watch after all) so tried to maintained a fast pace from there. Had a close battle with GrantM and my boss - I was overtaken by Ben but snuck ahead of GrantM... at least we gave each other a cheer instead of sledging :)
Passed the loud car playing midnight oil after the 5K turn around wondering what he would say if I requested the spice girls instead. Slogged up to the Weston Park turnaround, watching all the fast cocky boys running back towards me, then tried to maintain pace all the way home. Got within 10m of Ben on a hill, but he crept away on the downhill at the end, along with 2 girls who had obviously paced themselves very well. Surged round the final corner and got home in 42.28. A PB by just a few seconds - my recent best 10K was Canberra Times last year in 42.44.
Overall, a great day, and congrats to all the cockies esp the "fast boys" Grant, Shep, Lachy, Robw, Devil, Scotty, Patrick, Jase, and of course GrantM. I think everyone ran a good time, especially Roy :)
Enjoyed the "plan C" coffee option since I've never eaten at UrbanFood. It was quite tasty.

C • Pacing 5

Jogged round the O2 at Aranda Bushlands - good fun, thanks GrantM for setting the courses!

Rode to Aranda Bushlands O via a loop on Black Mountain. I had to walk up one steep hill, otherwise really enjoyed it and hopefully I am getting better.

Run with 8 girls and a dog (Ria's) round the lake loop from cath's driveway. Fun as usual but I was a bit tired from yesty's hills and struggled to run and keep up with the conversation at the same time :)

Bilbys hill ints round north lyneham led by devil. Good to do some hills, and it was a good group tonight. However I was a bit stressed at the start of the run, partly because I'd gone to all the trouble of riding to dickson only to discover the track session was cancelled, and also because I was worried about being dropped on the hill run, and indeed I was immediately dropped by the fast runners right from the start. Luckily there was another girl running at my pace (don't know her name) but she was really nice and we chatted for most of it about important things like how to get to the parlour room wine bar near rydges, and how good/bad is the new sex and the city movie. Enjoyed the run and was glad to do something different for a change, even though I was wearing bad shoes on the bitumen.

early morning run with katez since annette is still not running. good fun, easy pace.

Bilbys with Andre tonight, and a shorter set than usual, which suited my legs as they are recovering from the concrete of yesterday's run.
I did med-long set with 2 x 400m, 1 x 600m, 1 x 1km, 1 x 600m, 2 x 400m, 4 x 200m with 200m recovery in between. Consistently did 54 sec for the 200's. Warmed up with some orienteers: Devil, Phoebe, Fel and two Hyslops.
Splits for the efforts:
1'56, 1'56, 2'51, 4'44, 2'46, 1'51, 1'50, '54, '54, '54, '54

Sri Chinmoy Half down at Telopea Park in Kingston. Have never done this race before but knew a few bilby girls doing it, so decided to go down south and enjoy the chance for an easy long run. The course is a bit boring - 13 mile laps of the park on bike paths and a long boring downhill road bit. I did OK until about lap 7, then got bored, but enjoyed the last 3 laps, especially because Lucy was there doing the 5 mile, and also the bilby cheer squad cheered me along each lap, too. Lizzy flew round in a PB. I was happy to take it easy today, and stayed just ahead of Jess, and ahead of Kim and Kate. This would be a good race if fast runners want to win a trophy - small field and lots of trophies on offer!
Splits: 9'30, 8'27, 8'38, 8'16, 8'23, 8'22, 8'25, 8'22, 8'14, 8'33, 8'21, 8'21, 8'04 (average = 8'27 per lap but the first lap is a bit longer)

Cockies long run from hackett with JLA, devil, acejase, and robw. We did the usual Majura-Ainslie loop which was good fun especially since I haven't done many hills lately. Freezing cold at the start, and it took about half an hour for my feet to warm up. Good to chat with JLA on the run when the boys were way ahead. Fun time with the kids at acejase's afterwards for coffee and BBQ'd bacon and eggs.

CORC MTB women's-only lesson at Stromlo. Had heaps of fun with about ten other girls who are new to MTBing. I was one of the worst i.e. no technical skills whatsoever, but did fairly well on the long uphill climbing bits. Stacked it once going round a rocky corner up a hills, and pulled out of one of the river crossings (by walking over it) which was right at the start. Good fun, and got heaps of good tips from the coach, including the fact that my bike needs a good clean and the chain needs fixing.

Did a short easy run in the sunshine after the CORC lesson - mainly to calm down! Some of the downhill stuff we did at the end was the steepest I've ever ridden.

Skipped the girls run to do a super easy run in inner north suburbia.

Bilbys intervals - freezing tonight, lots of us complaining about how hard it was with the cold. I did medium of 3 x 800m then 6 x 400m. Got lots of NF100 tips from Lizzy.

Street O intervals set by me around Turner. I really enjoyed Miss Jones's O'Connor ints we did one summer morning ages ago, so replicated it a bit around Turner, although I think my ints were a bit on the long side, sorry everyone!
Had a reasonable run for most of it but I must have made a wrong route choice to number 2 in the first loop, since I dropped off the back there, and also number 6 was a bit tricky cos I didn't quite see the laneway and must have run past it. Skipped a few controls at the end of loops 2 and 3 since my brain was working at only about 50% capacity, but fortunately lucy, ria and catherine were also jogging by the last one and so we planned a girls night out on the last interval, that's how motivated we were. Good work by Ria for doing all of the 1st and 2nd loops, and especially Miss Jones, Devil and GrantM for battling it out to the very end. A good group tonight. I really enjoyed it - thanks to everyone who came along!

Up at 5am to run with Kate (see note from yesterday). We ran the "wrong" way round little black hoping to see the sunrise but we were a bit early for that. Kate is awesome, we had a good chat about the usual girly stuff plus she gave me some MTB tips.

bilbys long set of 4 x 1600m, felt really good so was able to run hard the whole way. splits = 7:20, 7:20, 7:15, 7:07. Good to catch up with the others in the warm up. Everyone is getting v. hardcore - so far people have done Cap Pun, XPD, NF100, not to mention the 1/2s and maras planned.

Spent a fun night cooking for the cockies in anticipation of wed ints. Then got a late-night "emergency" txt from Kate saying could I run early with her tomorrow since our other friend Anette had bailed? I said OK then set my alarm for very early....

no training today since I'm going to tidy up my flat before O on Wed (everyone should come, it's going to be FUN), plus I need to kick-start my plan of catching up on more sleep this week so that I don't feel tired on the weekends.

Note for GrantM: I have entered the Terry Fox run :)

C • Apparently 2

Red 3 Jim Sawkins Memorial Race. A great race today - I piked on the longer Red courses (CBF.... plus I wanted to make it back early to get a piece of cake from Blue Lightning since I just made it in time for cake at Kowen) but decided to really race hard on the Red 3. It was a fairly easy course for navigation, so pushed hard the whole way. Slight spot of bother at the last control - I got into a gully and thought I was too high up but actually was too low down, so lost a small amount of time there.

Nice cafe stop afterwards with Rob, Al, Max and Mira. Wilburs good again - we were too late for the breakfast menu but the pizzas were so worth it.

warm up to the start of O at a fast pace because 1. it was FREEZING and 2. I was running with devil.

ACTCCC Pennington run down at Weston Park. I did the girls 8K - it is SUCH a hard course, I was stuffed at the end and v. glad not to do 12K! Unfortunately I was way off my PB even though I was hoping to match it. Never mind, at least it's a good indicator of my current level. A great day for it too.

Good fun to catch up with TrevorJ, Vanessa, and other runners at the cool Yarralumla cafe I've always wanted to go to (although it is pricey.... coffee and raison toast was more than 12 bucks!). Trev was trying to persuade some of us to run with the fast girls at intervals and on sundays but then I realised he only wanted slow runners to come along to make him look good when he got dropped :)

I was v. tired after this effort - had to sleep for about an hour in the afternoon. Will try to catch up on sleep this coming week, it's been in short supply lately and I don't like feeling tired and "out of sorts".

Girls run from Lucy's but in her absence - there was me, cath, fel and phoebe today. We went up along the track below ainslie, called it quits at 20 mins then jogged back home again. Nice to catch up with the girls as always. Hope Lucy gets better soon.

sprint from home to lucy's cos I was running a bit late.

jog home after girls run.... arrived home at same time as cath who was in her car :) we had a good laugh about that.

Bilbys most boring set ever due to light failure - up and down a soccer pitch with up/down hard then one slow, continued for 25 mins. Good group, though, devil had some fast girls chasing him (not me, I was struggling tonight). Enjoyed it, glad it wasn't too long.

Run with the cockies from al and rob's - big turnout this week! We ran over comm bridge and around PH then back over the bridge again. Good fun, and definitely nice to catch up with everyone afterwards.

Bilbys intervals - I had set myself the goal of doing the long set tonight, which was 4 x 1km, then 4 x 600m with 200's recovery. Gary wanted us to do negative splits, which I sort of managed. Felt good all the way, it was a nice night for running but then cold as soon as you stopped.

Rode to/from bilbys. Forgot my jacket in my rush to get out the door to make it there on time, so froze on the way home. Not many people on the bike paths tonight and it was very dark, but I don't mind, it's always a good cool down after bilbys.