Training Log Archive: Sanders

Tour de Mountain 25 km
Up at the crackers again today - getting used to early morning starts now. Quite a big field of runners and cool conditions made it perfect for racing. I started out fairly conservatively up Taylor, quads cramped at the top so had to go slowly for a bit on the downhill and managed to get beaten by half the field. Even got sledged by Julie Quinn (are you just taking it easy Sandra? she said) so I lost a bit of confidence there, but got my own back on the slog up Wanniassa by overtaking quite a few people including my nemesis Cathy Crompton. Ran a bit quicker on the down hill then toughed it out over Isaacs Ridge, and really picked up the pace here. I knew Cathy would catch me if I slowed down, so ran as fast as I could back home again. Happy that I paced it well and ran strongly at the end. Best moment was running past Gary right at the end because he said I was "awesome", worst moment was getting spat on by one of the old XC men. At least he apologised. But it was still gross.
Ended up 14th girl, which is actually a really low placing compared to previous races. I didn't feel slow so maybe there's a whole lot of fast girls out there who I never get to run against.
Legs were really sore after this run, even when I tried to go to sleep at night.

Had promised to do one more long run with susie before the end of this year, so did the saturday long run with susie's mum runners, with a very early start of 6:15am. We ran from O'Connor up around little black mtn, then up the steep side of blackie to the circumcision track, around it, then all the way up to the top. Tried not to run too fast so that I would survive tomorrow's long one but Annette and Kate set a cracking pace, had to run at the back with Susie. Great morning for it, though.

girls group of cath, lucy, shan, and me, in the cool drizzle round parli house and a bit of lake bg. nice run, bit quicker than usual, good to catch up with the girls as always.

I did a shannon-shuffle of about 20 mins round the suburbs, really slowly. checked out all the gardens on the way, it's a nice place, the inner north.

6am run with susie's mum-runners group. Started out with 5 of us, but sam has a really sore leg and had to turn back at the first corner. The pace picked up, led by Anette and Kate, and Susie and I followed. We ran up to O'Connor ridge, then across Belco way with a loop around little black mtn, then back over the ridge and into O'Connor again. Good fun, and definitely worth getting up early for, mainly for all the gossip and funny stories from Kate, she's a crack up.

Orange 1 at Mt Ainslie. Had hoped to not run, seeing as I was rostered to help and it was very hot!, but in the end I wasn't needed to help at all. Didn't feel like I could get away with running O2 twice in a row so decided to attempt orange 1 even after seeing it went over hackett hill twice. Had a good run, but really slow to the first three, then managed to be a bit quicker I think, despite the hills. Got tired towards the end, though, and made a big mess-up at the last control, but otherwise very happy with the run, I think my navigation is slightly improving each week at the moment. Also feel like I'm running well.

hmmmm all that running on the weekend must be catching up with me, not feeling 100% today. No surprises there I suppose. Anyway struggled through the long set at Dicko ovals. It was a whistle set of 4 x 4 mins then 4 x 2 mins.

Good to do some of the usual stretches with Gary who "took one for the team" by sitting in the sun while the rest of us squished into the small amount of shade. Felt OK afterwards but generally tired today. The early start for Susies mum-runners group tomorrow is going to kill me.

BTW I've entered the long race in the Tour de Mountain.... had an request to run in a relay team with Parawangan Sue but had already committed to the long one.

ride on the bike paths down towards the lake and along a bit beside the lake, nothing special, but nice to get some fresh air.