Lots of fun running

Woohoo! I am enjoying my running so much at the moment.

I was trying to work out why the other day. I'm not running any faster, I'm only getting out a couple of days a week, I'm running well within my comfort zone, I nearly always run with someone else so I don't think it's the social aspect. Then I ran somewhere unexpectedly. I wanted to get there quickly. I don't remember why. What I do remember is that I realised that it was easy. I was running. I wasn't out of breath. I felt like I could keep going for ages. I was comfortable in what I was wearing. Suddenly it clicked. It's the 15 min warm up I've been doing for my PT sessions on the treadmill at Krissi's new gym.

Such a small thing but it's made an enormous difference. It's not even as though I'm running for the whole 15 mins. I walk for the first 4 at 6 km/h, then I run for a while at 7.5 km/h then Krissi ups it to 7.8 km/h until I stop. When Krissi first moved locations I dreaded that treadmill session. It seemed as though 15 mins was forever. Now, it's familiar territory. We don't always do it but I know I can do it easily.

How has this transferred out to my runs? Well, the first 10 mins of every run was the hardest for me. That's when my mind was saying "Kathy, what are you thinking? Why are you doing this to yourself?" Now, I head off on my run, and I'm straight into "this is fun" mode. How cool is that?

I've been meeting Kelly, who is doing "The Last Twenty" challenge with me, on Thursday mornings at 7 am. We've been doing a fairly easy run around Central Basin, Lake Burley Griffin. I emailed a few people to let them know that we were running, and now I'm meeting up with Lola, Fontessa, Sally, Kelly and whoever else wants to come along for a run. It's been great fun and some of us are meeting up to run longer on the weekends. It has taken us a few weeks to get any sort of routine going, but we're there now, so I think this will take us through the next few months at least.

My last twenty challenge is keeping me motivated, as running is a great way to burn calories. I've also set a few running goals, such as running Ben Donohoe in November. On top of that, Fontessa asked me if I would run City to Surf with her next year. I decided I'll give it a go. Sally has a hilly run that she's going to show us, to help us prepare for Heartbreak Hill. It sounds like we're going to have a lot of fun as a group. :-)

I've also got us organised to manage the different fitness levels and running goals of the group. It took some thinking, but we're going to try a combination of things. For instance, on longer runs, some people might ride their bikes while others might meet us for part of the run.

Thinking about that made me realise that today's run with Sally wasn't going to be long enough for me. At PT on Friday, I told Krissi that I had been thinking about running another half hour on top of the run with Sally. Now, telling Krissi you're thinking about exercising is the same as committing to it. Next thing you know, she'd organised for me to run the warm up with her and Fiona before meeting Sally. They are training for the half-mara at the Melbourne Marathon. I ran with them for 15 mins, then headed back to the ferry terminal to meet Sally. She ran out to meet me, so I was only running on my own for about 10 mins. It was easy to organise, I had fun running with three friends, I got my longer run, and I'm feeling terrific now.

I've been thinking about cycling to work now that the weather is not so cold but I haven't had any real motivation to get started. Krissi came to the rescue again. Fiona and I are teaming up to do the Urban Polaris in December. If I'm going to be on my bike all day I'd better get some practice in between now and then!

What a lovely day for a run

Kelly and I met up to run bridge to bridge this morning. For those of you who aren't familiar with Canberra, this is a run around the central basin of Lake Burley Griffin. You cross two bridges, which is where it gets its name. You're kind of running through postcard country the whole time you're doing it. Lots of people are out sightseeing or just walking around the lake.

Kel wanted to meet up at 10 am, which is way later than I usually run. I figured it would be good practice for next Sunday's Canberra Times fun run though, as that starts at 9:45 am, so I donned a hat, lathered up with sunscreen and enjoyed heading out without long sleeves for the first time in ages.

I wasn't sure what sort of run it would be. Kel hasn't run for ages, so I was quite prepared to take it slowly, and to cut the run down to half an hour if that was all that Kel wanted to do. We had a chat about what she wanted to achieve before we headed out. I told her that I wanted her to want to come back and run with me again, not to push herself so hard that she dreaded the thought of going for a run. Kel aimed for running B2B without stopping. It's about 5 kms. Kel runs a bit faster than me, although she doesn't think she does, so I was pretty sure that if I ran it at a steady pace, she would be quite comfortable.

We headed off with Kel talking nineteen to the dozen. That's pretty normal for Kel and it let me know that she was coping well with the pace. After a while she got quieter, so I knew to ease up a little. I took over the chat. We were talking about our "The Last Twenty" challenge. I got all excited about an idea we had and started running faster, then I realised and eased back again. Poor Kel!

We made it the whole way around, which is an absolute credit to Kelly. It took us 41 minutes, which we were both happy with. It was cool enough not to cook us, and sunny enough to make everything look fantastic. We didn't get tripped up by any dogs, kids or prams. We enjoyed it so much that we're going to meet up on Thursday at 7 am to do it all over again.

Running memories

I was updating my "The Last Twenty" blog today, and ended up doing a bit of a running retrospective. I've been running for over three years now. I'm really excited by that. I still feel like a complete newbie compared to so many people. It's good to look back and realise that I'm not.

I know that because I never seem to blog here that it seems as though I've stopped running. That's not the case. I ran 8 km with Krissi this morning, enjoying every minute of it. I've signed up for the 10 km Canberra Times fun run on 13th September. I'm doing that because of Fontessa, the girl who helped get me home in the half marathon. Krissi told me that Fontessa was going to run it, and was thinking of asking me to join her, so I jumped in ahead, signed up, and gave her a call. Then I thought, "oh my goodness, 10 km, can I do it?" After a minor panic I realised "of course I can" but I'm making sure that I get out there a little more than I have been lately. I've got a 5 km run organised for Sunday and I'll try to get my backside out there on Thursday morning this week too.

You've got to love the added incentive that signing up for an event gives you.

Launching "The Last Twenty"

It's been quiet here on the "I Can Run Too" front. That doesn't mean that there hasn't been plenty going on. Instead, I've been busy doing other stuff.

However, I'm here to ask you all for help. I've really been struggling to lose weight. I've managed to regain 18 kilos of the 43 I originally lost and I want to turn that around.

To that end, I've come up with a plan, that's all explained on my new blog - The Last Twenty. I hope you'll read the plan and come to my aid.

Thanks in advance. Your help is much appreciated.

Half Marathon Report

The most important part of this post is "Yay! I did it!"

On Sunday, 17 May 2009, I managed to finish the 40th Canberra Half Marathon, with a gun time of 3:01:20. Considering my pre-race goals were to (a) finish it and (b) get there in approx 3 hours I'm pretty happy with that result. Mind you, it took me a while to realised that I'd achieved my goals. Even after all the training I managed to crash and burn at the 15 km mark. The last six kms were simply horrendous at the time. Funnily enough, when I look back on it, they're the six kms that make me proud because I got through them.

Lots of great things happened on my journey to that finish line. Realising that I could run the distance after I made it around West Basin the first time was a wonderful moment. Knowing that TB was cooking me pasta on Friday and Saturday night to help me fuel up for the race made me grateful again for having such a wonderful partner. He remembered that we'd gone to a pasta night the year before, when Jess and Nicole ran the half marathon, and decided to make sure that I had plenty of carbohydrates before I ran. I made some new running friends too, which is always a bonus.

On the morning of the race I was keen to get there. TB offered to drop me at Lennox Gardens, but I assured him that I'd be able to find parking without any trouble. I told him I'd be home around one and headed off in his ute, after checking that he didn't need it. Driving to a half marathon in a V8 is quite motivational. All that power under the bonnet!

Parking wasn't as easy as I expected. There were people and cars everywhere. I found a park and was on my way out through a gate when somebody warned me that they were locking the gate shortly. Thank goodness I was still there and could move the car. I relocated myself to the other side of Commonwealth Avenue and walked a bit further than I'd planned. I was on my way to meet the other five (Krissi, Lola, Julie, Amy and Laura) when I passed the queue to the toilets. I reconsidered, joined the queue, and finally got myself to the meeting point with a few minutes to spare. Krissi had been starting to panic that I'd decided to pull out. I have to admit, when I saw the crowd the thought did cross my mind. "What am I doing?" I thought. "Why don't I just run 21.1 km another day when there's nobody around?"

Lola, Julie and I were running together. This is us before the race. Don't we look fresh and happy?

The other three were planning to run much faster than us. While they moved off into the crowd of runners waiting for the start we found ourselves a position at the back of the field. I think we enjoyed the start much more than they did because we had a lot more room to move. It was hard to hold back when the crowd of over 800 runners headed off into the distance, but we managed to run the first section quite sensibly. Here's us at the start. Lola is leading the way.

We were running a bit ahead of schedule but we were soon left well behind everyone else. There were a few people just in front of us and a couple of ladies who were walk/running who kept passing us briefly and then catching us up. A race medic on a bike came to check out how we were going at about the 3 km mark. He encouraged us to keep a steady pace and told us he'd check up on us again about half way.

At the 5 km mark we were still ahead of schedule. We expected to run about 8:30 mins/km over the race but we were averaging at about 7:45 mins/km at that stage. We were averaging around 8 mins/km at the 10 km mark which surprised all three of us. After the half way point I started to fall behind but I was still feeling good at the 12 km mark where I was pleasantly surprised to see TB waiting for me. I really hadn't expected him to be there so it was a huge morale boost. He jogged along beside me in his jeans for a short while, then headed off home to hang out some washing, with the promise that he'd be there to meet me at 12 pm, which is when I expected to cross the line. At that stage I had started to have visions of being there 10 minutes earlier.

I was starting to feel the run but I was still confident of managing to run the whole way around. I stopped for a badly needed toilet break, which took me 90 seconds, and then headed off again. Fontessa, a new running friend I met through Krissi, had offered to run part of the way with me. I met her at about the 14.5 km mark. I was struggling up that hill, which wasn't all that big a hill, so I was delighted to see her. Then I don't know what happened. I saw the 15 km marker and I broke. I just couldn't run past it. I dropped to a walk. I managed to get myself running again, but only for a short distance.

Mentally I was a mess. I didn't say much to Fontessa about it, because I didn't want to ruin her day, but I was in the depths of despair. For some reason I decided that I wasn't going to be able to run another step. I worked out that it would take me an hour to walk 6 km to the finish at my fast walking pace. Then my maths brain went to mush and I decided that I wouldn't be able to finish in anything under 3.5 hours. In fact, I was sure it was going to take me 4 hours. I just wanted to curl up into a ball and cry. In fact, if Fontessa hadn't been there, I think I would have.

I came up with all sorts of solutions. Maybe I could call TB and he could pick me up. Maybe I could suggest to Fontessa that we run back to her car and drive around to the finish line. Maybe I could ask one of the officials to give me a ride back with them when they packed up. In the meantime, Fontessa was coming up with all sorts of encouraging suggestions. Perhaps setting a goal ahead to run to would help. "I don't think so," I would reply in what I thought of as a sad pathetic voice, suitable for a loser who couldn't run any further than 15 km. She'd jog along beside me as I walked. I'd try to run again, thinking darker and more desperate thoughts. I felt guilty because I was ruining Fontessa's run. I felt guilty because I was going to be late to the finish line. I felt guilty because I was letting everyone down by failing to run the whole way. I felt guilty because those walk/run ladies were now out of sight somewhere ahead of me.

I realised that I was last as there was an official riding a bike just behind me. I'd been so sure that I was going to finish ahead of the walk/run ladies.

Then a light dawned. I used to be one of those walk/run ladies. I used to push myself through walk/run intervals. Maybe I could do it again. After all, my goal was to finish the half marathon. I'd vowed I'd get across the line even if I had to walk the last few kms.

I started running for a minute and then walking for a minute. Fontessa kept encouraging me and trying to distract me with general chatter. Somewhere I changed from running a minute at a time to running to a tree or a signpost. I told Fontessa that her goal idea was working for me and she started setting the goals for me, a little further than I would have set them, but I dug deep and headed for her goals. After a couple of kms of this I tried to run a bit further than the goal each time. I made it past the point where we used to meet to start our long runs and I came to a halt again. "I can't run any more," I said. "I'll walk from here."

Fontessa stopped jogging and started walking with me. We turned a bend and I saw a lovely long flat stretch of bike path beside the lake. I started to run again, telling Fontessa I was going to make it to the official at the foot of the Commonwealth Bridge. She started jogging with me again, encouraging me all the way. On that stretch I decided that I was going to walk up to the highest point on the bridge and then try to run the rest of the way. I managed to get myself going again. Fontessa chatted away, distracting me, and I kept running.

I saw TB sitting on a bench a short distance before the finish line. I was so glad to see him. I just wanted to run over to him, hug him and burst into tears, but I wanted to finish the run more. I knew he'd be disappointed if I stopped so close to the finish line so I said a quick hello and kept going.

On my way to the finish line I saw another running friend, Michael. He was yelling out encouragement. I didn't say anything to him. I had my eyes on that finish line. Fontessa stopped running with me and let me run towards it by myself. As I ran up the grass I could hear my name being called out by other running friends. Even crowd members were yelling "Go Kathy". I could hear the announcer encouraging me. I heard a squeal and then saw Krissi tearing down beside the ropes to scream encouragement at me. On the inside I would have loved to do the whole arms in the air and enjoy the moment thing but I just put my head down and ran to that line. I was never so glad to stop running in my life.


That's me, a moment after I crossed the line. I'm amazed that I don't look like I'm about to collapse. I saw the 3 hours on the clock and I heard people yelling "Three hours, well done!" as I passed them, but it didn't register that I'd made it in the time I'd hoped until about half an hour later.

I found all the girls I'd trained with and congratulated them. I said hi to the running girls who'd come out to the finish to congratulate Lola and I on our first half marathon. I found Fontessa to thank her and TB found me and gave me a huge hug. I did all that in a daze of disappointment. I was trying so hard not to let people know that I was miserable. I was smiling and thanking people for their support and being pleased with their times and all I could feel was an overwhelming sense of failure. I really couldn't leave there fast enough.

I was dropping Fontessa back at her car before heading home. TB had magically managed to park next to me, so we walked over to the cars together. I'm glad I didn't park further away! He offered to drive Fontessa back for me, but I wanted to thank her again for all her encouragement so I took her. It was something Fontessa said, although I don't remember what, that made me realise that I had indeed achieved exactly what I'd set out to achieve. I think maybe that the sugar from the fruit juice they handed me with my participant's medal had kicked in to, and that my brain was finally starting to process information again. I suddenly snapped out of it and realised that I had done it!

It wasn't until much later in the day that I finally asked TB if he thought I'd come last. I was pretty sure I had but I needed to check. He laughed and assured me that I had. I asked him how he knew. There might have been a runner another five minutes behind me. "The fire truck took off when they saw you were ok." I hadn't realised that the firemen had also been keeping an eye on me. Fontessa had remarked that she hoped they were cute but I didn't have enough energy to check them out when we went past them.

The provisional results are out now and I definitely was last. I came 843rd and I'm so proud that I achieved a placing instead of a DNF.

All the training paid off. I was a little sore after the run but I recovered even faster than I did after the last long run before the race. The next morning, when I was driving to work, I decided that I'd run in next year's half marathon. This time I'm going to cross the line in less than 3 hours!

Training update

I realised a couple of weeks ago that I achieved my running goals. As you will see in the side bar, my current running goals are: 1. Have fun 2. Run without injury 3. Run three times a week, including a long run 4. Run outside at least once a week 5. Run for longer.

Now that I'm training for the Canberra Half Marathon, on 17th May, I've managed to achieve all of these goals. I'm running on Tuesdays with Krissi, my trainer, and Lola, who is sharing Tuesday's PT session with me as we both train for the half mara. On Thursdays I'm running on my own, to work when I'm in Canberra, and in the general vicinity of the hotel when I'm working in Melbourne, and on Saturdays I usually do my long run with Lola and Julie.

When I first started running I would think up my blog entry as I ran. I still do that, but I don't get online often enough to spend time updating my blog lately. At most, I change my facebook status to mark achievements like this morning's run of 17.7 km, and then I read all the blogs that have provided me inspiration over the years.

Seeing that I am online today, I thought I'd try to capture the key changes in my running.

- The first few km are still the hardest, but I am running them with much more confidence in being able to keep going. Most of my "what am I doing? why am I out here when I could be in bed?" conversations happen before I get to the 3 km mark. Nowadays I seem to be able to ignore the voice that says "stop" more easily, although there are occasions when it still wins.

- I've learned that I'm more likely to run when I either (a) have someone to run with or (b) have a purpose to the run like getting to work.

- I'm getting better at ignoring things like the weather. I know I'll warm up after a few km, that I can survive running into a head wind for a while, and that light rain is my friend.

- I don't worry so much about minor problems such as blisters. I tape them and run again. Minor niggles such as stone bruises might hurt but they can be ignored for km at a time.

- I recover really well, particularly after a long run. I've realised that I'm extremely lucky in that regard. To my absolute delight my dodgy knee is holding up well. All that strengthening work I've done with Krissi has paid off.

With regards to other training, I haven't been doing much. I have my regular Friday PT sessions with Krissi. We've been concentrating on leg exercises - squats, lunges, hamstring curls, calf raises, leg raises, etc. For a change of pace yesterday we did boxing. I'd forgotten how much I loved it. I'm feeling it in my back today. I did have quite an amusing moment yesterday; when Krissi complained about how hard I was punching I reminded her that she was the one who'd helped me build up my upper body strength. She laughed and stopped complaining.

My workmates are doing another six week bootcamp and have inspired me to get myself back into the gym. I'm not going to renew my Fernwood membership. The Civic gym worked really well for me when I lived a couple of blocks away but I don't get myself there since I moved away. I thought about it and have decided to see what sort of programs they have at the gym at the bottom of my street. It was closed for a while because of a fire but it's re-opened recently. I was going to stagger down there this afternoon after my post-run hot bath but TB saved me the trip - they open Saturday mornings. I'll have to call in one evening next week.

I'll be sure to find the time to post an entry on the half marathon. Hmm, I wonder - will I need to find myself some new running goals?

Weekly update

Well, it's been a great exercise week, even if I have been recovering from my wonderful holiday in China. We arrived home at 1:30 pm on Monday and I was out running at 7:30 am the next day. It sounded like a good idea at the time, when I organised it with Krissi a few days earlier, but it certainly did not seem sensible when the alarm went off on Tuesday morning. I was really tempted to pike out on my first half marathon training session. Fortunately I thought about (1) how good I'd feel after getting out there and running; (2) how one more hour's sleep wasn't going to make that much difference; and (3) how guilty I'd feel if I missed out on the run. After I finished running I felt great!

Although I was up in plenty of time, I ended up being late for the run. Everything seemed to be moving in slow motion. I think it was me who was moving slowly! Krissi and Lola were just about to leave when I arrived. We ran along the bike path towards Lyneham. It's a familiar run, which made it a lot easier for me. I was able to chat away about China as we went. I think people will find that my China trip improves their running speed, as they frantically try to get away from me!

I wasn't too worried about the time, which is just as well. We ran about 5.3 km in just over 45 mins. As we went, Krissi chatted about our half marathon training program. My personal goals for the half are to enjoy the run, to complete the distance and to run as much of the way as I can manage. I'm not too fussed about time. I know I can run 8 min kms fairly consistently, so I'm expecting to get around in under 3 hours. How much under, I don't know or care at the moment. I guess I'll have a better idea after we've done some longer runs.

Lola had arranged to run with her friend, Julie, on Thursday. She kindly invited me along, which solved my "get out of bed and run on your own" problem. I met up with them at Lake Ginnenderra at 7 am. It was weird. I felt like we were running so slowly. In fact, I was wondering if running with the others was such a good idea, as it was a major effort for me to keep back with them. When we finished, I realised we'd covered 6.3 km in 49 mins. We'd actually run a little faster than we'd run on Tuesday. I must have been tired on Tuesday morning!

It was a pleasant chatty run. I've run around the lake a few times, doing the ABS fun run and the Ben Donohoe fun run. It was good to run it again. The last time I did it I really struggled to get around. This time it seemed easy.

I don't remember when I've looked forward to a run so much. Lately it's been a real struggle to get my butt out there, but this morning I was keen to go. I bounded out of bed enthusiastically.

One thing about running with other people, the time just flies. I also find that it's easier to stop and stretch properly as I'm still chatting away at the end.

We're running again on Sunday - 10 km. We're going out and back along the lake. I'm pretty sure the route has been chosen so that we are running up University Hill at the end, when we're tired.

This morning (Friday) was my usual PT session with Krissi. It was good to be back to normal. After 15 mins on the stationary bike (a great way to catch up on all the news) and some stretching we moved on to squats. Normally I do three sets and then move on to something else. Today I did 12 squats (30 kg on the bar), then 12 lunges on the step, then 12 hamstring curls, then repeated the set. I remembered Lola saying that Krissi had caned her legs on Wednesday at her PT session so I figured she was doing it to mine too. After that we did some floor exercises that had my legs crying! My abs got a workout too. Some upper body work and then some side bridges. I suck at those. I have a feeling that Krissi is going to make sure that I don't suck at them soon.

I'm in the middle of decision mode at the moment, working out whether or not I'll play hockey this year. My club isn't fielding a grass team. The advantages for me of playing grass are (1) it's social, so you don't have to train; (2) it's grass so it's slower than turf; and (3) I don't have turf stick skills as I never played on turf back in the old days. If I decide to play turf I'll have to train. Mind you, because I'm going to be running more I'll be the fittest I've ever been for a hockey season. That would be novel. Tomorrow is grading but I have been invited to a friend's wedding ceremony at that time. I'd like to do both. I guess that grading is really only important if you're trying to get into the 1sts. I'm pretty sure that they can grade me within 5 minutes of my showing up at training. My other option is to play with a different team in the grass competition. Decisions, decisions! I'm leaning towards playing turf except for fitting training and playing into my schedule.

One thing for sure, much as I loved my holiday in China, it's good to be home and getting back into my exercise routine!