The English woman who went up a mountain and came down.......a mountain

On Sunday we did the Camden Haven King of the Mountain.
As stated in a few posts back I like to have my pre-race routine and get a little panicky if I cannot stick to it.
This is often trickier when you are away from home and even harder when other people are cooking for you and providing food.

We were staying at my grandparents in laws and this is one reason that I didn't go into the run with any expectations or goals, that and the fact I hadn't trained!

We woke on the morning still a little sure whether we'd go ahead with it. Registration was on the day so we had nothing tying us in. We managed to get out of bed through and after a bowl of Nurti grain (not my usual "breakfast of champions" porridge) headed to the start.

Registration was quick, we had grabbed an old banana from the house but it was a bit too mushy for my liking.
We were told to self seed ourselves:
Group one were the elite who were hoping to be in with a chance of being king and queen of the mountain.
Group two were the under 17s who were hoping to win prince or princess of the mountain.
Group three, which we put ourselves in, was people who knew they wouldn't win but where hoping to run most the way.
Group four were the back of the packers.

Michael Clease and I started together. It was straight into the hills! It wasn't long until Michael Clease headed off in front of me.
It really was one big hill! I thought there might be a few flats between hills and maybe even a little down hill but no, just one consistent long hill.
After about 10minutes I realised I was going to have to do some walking, I started doing a few minutes walking and a few running, most the people around me where in a similar position and after a while I got into a bit of a "race" with a guy in Vibrams. He'd run past me as I walked and then he's have to slow right down while I walked and ran past.

Thankfully the end 500m was flat and I was able to run into the finish. I finished in 42:44 and Michael Clease in 40:29. Somehow I managed to finish 6th in my age group out of 38!!!
With a bit of training I probably could have come 3rd in my age group but the winning female did it in 30mins so I'm not sure I could beat her!

View from the top, taken from Wikipedia

 We hung around at the end for a while wondering what the deal with the bus was. Supposedly the bus took everyone back down to the bottom but with nearly 400 people we wondered how it was going to work.
They had suggested at the beginning that some people might like to run back down the road but that sounded a bit boring to us.
After a while of hanging out and checking out the view we saw some people walking down what looked like a track.
We decided to go for it and spent a fun 20mins scurrying down a slopes, stairs and rocky paths. I figured it would be good training for the upcoming Fitzroy Falls Marathon.

A new obsession

I have a new obsession! Its reading up on ultra running trail events. Things like The North Face 100, which is a 100km run through the Blue Mountains. There are lots of race reports out there on the world wide web as well as discussions of kit (possibly the cause of my obsession is the potential opportunity to buy new clothes!) as there is a strict gear list. One day I hope to by able to compete in this race although I do wonder if I have the motivation for the training involved.

But to matters a little more realistic.  I have the Camden Haven King of the mountain coming up, I touched upon this in an earlier post. Its this Sunday and it is a 5.5km run up North Brother mountain, a small mountain in the mid north coast of NSW. It will be tough, I'll probably walk some of it! Its a small town run with not a large entry field, I therefore allowed myself to consider the possibility of being first female (and maybe Michael Clease as first male) until I read a newspaper article that said the winner in 2010 finished in 23:13! And the first female in 28:48! Blimey I can only just run a flat 5km in that time!!

We will be doing it, however, while up visiting Michael Cleases grandparents, Michael Cleases granddad makes homebrew beer! I have not tried running 5km after a night of homebrew beer....I wonder if it will pass the drug test? Race report to follow.x

City to Surf number 3 - Race report

I am becoming a little fanatical about my race day morning ritual, if my porridge doesn't have sunflower seeds in I may as well not even both turning up! Ok slight exaggeration but I do like to stick to my tried and tested routine.
Thankfully Sunday morning went to plan, I got up with plenty of time, had my race day outfit planned already and had a leisurely breakfast.
We were collected at 7:05am, about 5minutes late and I stressed a little as we had to then catch a train but we made it with plenty of time.

There was six of us in our group but unfortunately due to some entering later than others we were spread over different groups.
The City to Surf advertises itself as the worlds biggest fun run and this year it had 85,000 spots available. Due to its huge size it has around 7 different start groups with each taking about 30mins to go over the start line. This meant that despite our friends being in the group behind us our gun time was 8:30am and theirs was 9am.

We stayed with them right till our gun was about to go off which meant we were practically at the back of our group, presumably with about 12,000 people in front of us! 
The City to Surf is notorious for being so crowded that you have to dodge and weave to get past all the people slower than you. I have heard it called the Sardine to Surf before!

However what it lacks in room to move it makes up for in entertainment on route. People who have houses on the route set up breakfast bbqs, pump up the music and generally entertain themselves watching everyone go by, one pub has a band on its roof playing everything from Kiss to YMCA and there is always a great brass band made up of old guys near the end. Thankfully this year was glorious weather, with a top of 23C I believe. 

It was a tough run, surprisingly heartbreak hill (no need for any more description) did not test me as much as I was expecting, it must have been due to the hill training I did the week before but I really felt the small inclines. 

From the beginning I was aiming for a sub 80mins. I knew roughly what time I needed to each km but hadn't worked it out precisely. I am very pleased to say I came in at 79mins15 with an average speed of 5m39 kilometers. Michael Clease ran with me most the way (in his usual forcefield kind of way) and sprinted to the finish for a 79min09 time. 

 Once we'd hung around to cheer in the rest of our group we headed to the pub for a burger and beer to celebrate. 

Embracing my inner hippie

My mind is a little all over the place at the moment, i'm struggling to concentrate at work, i'm sleeping all the way to work on the train, my weekends are feeling like they go by and i've achieved nothing. I think its time to give my mind a little kick start and hopefully it will improve my general health too.

I've decided to try a meditation and yoga class. I've tried a little yoga in the past and meditation is something i've always wanted to learn. The first class is on Monday. I'm hoping it will free my mind for an hour or so and then help me think more clearly after.

I've also been looking into raw food a bit recently. I can't say I altogether agree with the idea of not cooking anything but the way I see it is that it will just force you to eat healthier, less processed foods and more fruit and veg. There are countless raw food recipes online and with a bit of browsing you can find things that aren't too scary!

Something like this doesn't fit the usual raw food stereotype and looks pretty damn tasty. Although it suggests using a dehydrator (like lots of raw recipes do) it gives you the oven option too. I might give it a go this weekend.
http://www.rawfoodrecipes.com

Whats your style

Michael Clease calls me the tractor, i have quite a slow steady pace but manage to still power up hills at that same pace. The negative is that I tend to not speed up much as I go down the hills.
Michael Clease was described the other day has having a forcefield, whenever someone gets near him he picks up the pace. Thats why he always seems to run 5 metres in front of me!

Despite my ability to plod up hills, with the city to surf fast approaching, I decided a little hill work might be beneficial.
I've never done specific hill training, in fact I tend not to do much specific training for my marathons. I do the required long runs and try and fit in as many of the shorter ones as I have time for but I never do tempo sessions or recovery runs or those technical sounding things.

Luckily (or maybe unluckily) we are at quite a low lying area so there are lots of up hills nearby. I chose one just round the corner and set about running up it. I managed the first up and down in around 7mins 30 so I gave myself the target of 4 reps to equal 30mins session. I was a little worried that if anyone was looking out their window or walking on the pavement that they might think I was strange so for my second leg I switched road sides, unfortunately there wasn't much of a pavement so I was slowed a little looking out for tree roots etc.

I'm pleased to say I managed all four up and downs and the last one I did at a 5.5min per km pace.
Maybe i'll managed to sneak in a tempo session before Sundays City to Surf.

With my mind on the Fitzroy Falls fire trail Marathon I am thinking about all things trail running. I have my birthday coming up soon and I'm wondering what sort of trail gear I can get for it??? The obvious thing would be some trail trainers but I don't know if they are really necessary. I do quite like the look of these inov-8s!

I also found this online today http://www.chslsc.com/king-of-the-mountain-fun-runwalk.html Its pretty much a run up a big hill but I reckon its good training for FFFTM.

Oh I do like a bit of trail running!!