Sunday 25 May 2008

Sort of a Marathon as i do my shortest race for two years


Finally decided that i would do the Warwick Half Marathon which is part of a 5 run Marathon over the weekend at Warwick. With a chiropractor appointment on Monday it seemed silly to not give myself a hard race beforehand (having not run a race shorter than a half - excepting the "Beer Mile" and weekly 5KM Gunn Runs when i was living in Melbourne - it was 40 races since my last Half Marathon, May 2006 and also my first Half in Queensland since Gladstone in 1989 !!).
Bit like Marathons i know that with no speed work i've pretty much got a fastest possible time and in this case it tends to be around 85 to 86 minutes.
168 Runners, not bad for a little town 2 Hours west of Brisbane and lot's of familiar faces, started well but 5K's in was feeling something like a stitch, ultimately i think it was more back related, but the next 10K's weren't overly comfortable. Thankfully the road had good ascents and descents to use muscles slightly differently and was going smoothly by the end. My pet hate in races where you have a 90 degree turn at the finish, in this event the 21K was on the corner and then you turned, reckon i was passed by two runners in that little bit rather frustratingly. Ended up with 1:29:48 so not quite as good as i'd hoped but like a sub 3 Hour Marathon a sub 90 Minute Half keeps me happy enough.
Breakfast (well breakfast number 2 i'd had mine watching the Test Match from the Windies at 5), was a big variety of food, i mainly stuck to homemade cakes and orange juice typical me post race.
I'd then decided i'd head homewards and do some trails on the Main Range National Park at Cunninghams Gap, but was curious about the second event the 4.6K Cross Country and by the time i'd followed the arrows there (and had got lost driving around a paddock of cows) thought it wouldn't do me any harm.
167 Starters, not sure how many of them had also done the Half (talking to some beforehand there were some new guns here for the shorter events), felt strange jumping tree stumps etc, but ultimately it was like a short trail run, 54th in a time of 20:20 i think, not too bad and now time for that beer i had in esky (Afternoon by then).
This time it was all over so i took my number off, and headed into town for lunch.
Ended up joining some other runners, the fact i had calamari, fish bites and chips as opposed to their toasted sandwiches pretty much showed i wasn't racing again today and they were.
Actually my intention was to finish off my own version of a multi part marathon, the trails at Cunninghams Gap, looking at signs it was 5.1Ks to Mount Mitchell (the picture taken from it), 2.5K's to a picnic area and then a 1.4K lookout lap in total 16.6K's just what i needed. By then it was just after 3 so knew i'd be pushing to make it back before sunset, so first it was Mt Mitchell an absolutely beautiful area with great views, back to the car by 4:30 and time to scare a few roos on the way through (get's darker here earlier as the sun sets behind the range), still vaguely light by the time i'd done that 5K's so didn't bother with the torch for the last loop (pitch black pretty quick though).
Then back home, nicely timed for the Richmond V Essendon Match at 7:30.
No thoughts of a Gold Coast Runners Club run this Sunday morning too busy sleeping it had been a hard day.
Still did a midday 30K's and definitely needing the chiro the next day, but overall very content with my fitness in the lead up to the 100K's on June 8.
Chiro today and a fair bit of manipulation, will go back on Friday and take it relatively easy this week (music may be more of a focus than running just for a change :-) ).

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