Training Log Archive: Sanders

no training today, still feeling unwell. fortunately it's not the flu, just a cold. my head is very hurty.

Jim Sawkins Memorial Handicap Trophy. I did the Red 2 (10 km) course. This was a really great course with lots of contrast - bush/open, hills/flat, spur-gully/sand-mining. I made a few little mistakes but nothing major, and it was really runnable, so I enjoyed it all the way, it was a lot of fun. I even took my splits:
4'22, 11'45, 6'19, 16'02, 7'56, 5'36, 6'29, 5'17, 1'53, 5'39, 7'51, 5'06, 1'43.
I was really worried about the sand-mining area because I couldn't handle that in the middle distance champs recently, so I took it really carefully there.

Bush capital marathon runs. Still not feeling 100%, so didn't do the 25 km as planned - instead I jogged round the 16 km course. Beautiful day for it. Felt OK once I got started, but didn't push it at all.

Black Mountain Cup today, hooray! Did a good warm up, and started the race well. Ran as hard as I could, but not quite as good as last year. Last year I was second female but this year could only manage third. More importantly we got the Cup back, thanks to speedy running by teammates Devil (2nd overall, good one!), Bendy, and Dave. I stayed in front of Ben for a while but only until the first downhill. Pretty stuffed after this one. Also glad they don't drug test, I had to take a few painkillers again today to survive. Yummy BBQ afterwards too.

ride to/from work

devil's cockies intervals with fel, lucy and devil. we did the crackenback loop with surges on the hills. I was pretty wired after taking a large dose of panadol - have a really sore throat at the moment. It was a good session, though, and definitely good practice for the black mountain cup tomorrow.

ride to/from work, nothing special but had to stay a bit later at work to dodge the dodgy weather. Good fun riding though.

bilbys intervals - did medium set (2 x (1200m (400), 800m (200), 400m (200)) with an extra 400m at the end. Aim was to be speedy in preparation for the race of the year this coming Friday. Felt quite good and legs seemed to be moving quickly enough, I think it's all the cycling. Splits: 5'24, (2'26), 3'34 (1'10), 1'48 (1'11), 5'39 (2'27), 3'34 (1'09), 1'47, (1'09), 1'48 (2'40).

Battled with my bike this evening to replace the chain - despite reading the instructions I had absolutely no idea what I was doing, especially when the old chain zipped off and it took me forever to figure out how to thread the new one back in. Also I managed to grease up the entire house in the process, so I hope it was all worth it and that it holds together tomorrow.

C • Much further 2

ride to/from work. fairly freezing on the way in, my fingers were really numb.

happy that I don't have to run the wagga mara this year - and not even the half either. I was supposed to run the half in a team but fortunately the other runner is going solo. yay for me. I am very relieved.

long run with the cockies from hackett gates. good fun with fel, shan, devil and morten, up majura, down through the pines, over hackett hill and up ainslie. morten and I got dropped towards the end. poor morten was most distressed at seeing the others surge ahead (where have they gone? he asked) so I had to reassure him that the leaders generally don't wait, sometimes you have to find your own way home! cafe was yummy, it was a good run all round

jog round bruce ridge, saw lots of controls from the orienteering this morning

lunchtime run, feeling really flat this week after googong

ride to/from work

bilbys intervals, big laps of the oval tonight. I kind of stuffed up the set by doing 5 laps instead of 4, so cut down on the long-short stuff. felt like i was running fairly well but a bit tired and sore from the half. Must be tired since I forgot to eat half my dinner (bizarre but true) and ate lots of chocolate, then discovered the rest of my dinner sitting on the table (I'm eating it now).
splits = 3'34 (1'33), 3'40 (1'30), 3'44 (1'32), 3'43 (1'36), 3'42 (2'57)
long/short = 1'15 ('44), 1'00 ('47), 1'20 ('41), 1'02

fairly cruisey ride to/from work, round the western side of the lake. glad for headlamp and foglight on the way home, it was spookily dark

sort of a recovery run today from hackett gates with devil and susie. good fun to catch up with susie, haven't seen her for ages. we went round the back of ainslie up over hackett hill and home again, finishing just before fel, phoebe, jose and beth. very glad of the slower pace for once, although devil was fairly sprightly up hackett hill I have to say. Legs quite stiff and sore towards the end of the run, unsurprisingly. A good crowd at deli marco. I totally recommend the omelette, yummo.

Googong Half today! What a tough race, I'd almost forgotten how hard that course is. This has been my goal race for the past couple of months and I was hoping to have a good race today. Nice weather for it, fairly cool but warm enough for shorts. Had fun in the warm up doing the first little loop a few times. Started out reasonably conservatively, taking care on the first couple of hills not to overdo it. On the steeper climbs nearer the dam, I managed to overtake a few people and had a bit of a battle with one guy who stayed just ahead of me the whole way. Was quite pleased with my effort at halfway, and seemed to be pacing it well. The last few hills on the way back were really painful, but I could see my boss just ahead and got some motivation to push it fairly hard on the flat bits back home, nearly catching him. Despite the tough course, I really enjoyed today's run and smashed last year's time by 7 mins, so very happy with that. Highlight of the day was seeing devil lead the field around the first loop, Jackie Fairweather determinedly sitting on his tail, then devil still ahead when they past me near the halfway mark, Jackie frowning and looking displeased, and finally seeing that Jackie had stopped racing towards the end and was just jogging back, smashed by the devil. what a great battle.

C • good run 2

slow ride into work, nothing special. I wish I was a faster cyclist though, I'm always being overtaken by super commuters.

super slow on the way home - felt really unwell and shaky today, so crawled into bed pretty soon after getting home. slept about 14 hrs straight I think, almost a pb

thursday cockies ints of 3 x 8 mins round little black mtn. good fun, massive turnout of ben and I, then Fel rocked up. top morning for it, not frosty at all.
warmed up by running from csiro, short warm down jogging down the hill

rode to/from work. accidentally lost a contact lens at home this morning so had to go the short way to work owing to lots of stuffing around without much success, fortunately got to ride the long way home

Went to physio today for crook legs. She was pretty good, moved my legs all around and made me do heaps of stretches. Apparently my quads are really strong compared to my glutes, so it seems my quads are taking most of the load when I run and likely to get overloaded, hence occasional cramping. Now I have to do lots of glute strengthening (and back stretches because having weak glutes has also affected my back). The best thing was she said her running friend has also had weird quad cramping like me but seems to have overcome it with glute strengthening. No more piking out of the swan stretch at bilbys for me :(

Tuesday bilbys, a good fast set tonight of 4 x (3 min, 2 min, 1 min) with 1 min rests in between, although Gary stuffed up the first one and we had to do 4 mins with 2 mins rest. Felt soooo much better running tonight than last week. Funniest warm up ever was Gary's idea that smiling at your nemesis in a race gives you the psychological edge (what do you think, Jase?), so we had to do a warm up drill while smiling. Shane complained his teeth got cold which was very funny I thought. Weird walking woman on the track necessitated fast lane changes to avoid crashing into her, very bizarre, there was a whole empty oval and she chose to walk round the track in the middle of bilbys????

C • odd bod 1

warm up warm down etc

lunchtime run, a bit chilly

Red 3 at Orroral. Was worried I might not make it round Red 2 owing to thick terrain and my shithouse nav, so opted for Red 3. Had a great time, no major stuff-ups apart from two controls in the steep and rocky thick bits. Oh and also made an error at number one because I ran straight past it. But overall it was good fun, enjoyed the course, and top weather to boot.

jog round little black mtn, lots of runners out and about, legs tired today

Street O with Shan, Lucy, Devil, Davin, and Fel. Super fun legs around O'Connor, I really enjoyed it, good fun trying to pick the fastest route between controls. I did one really good route choice and few dodgy ones. Felt like I was running solidly, legs a bit stiff by the end hence the long cool down.
splits = 8'50 (is that right or have I mis-timed it??), 5'20, 6'36
warm up = 14'00 plus about 10'00 jog from work
rest = long cool down via secret bush track beside dryandra street

ride to/from work, home via embassies and massive hill which completely stuffed me.

jog round little black mtn at lunchtime, felt quite good today, glad to see a few rays of sunshine