Sunday, November 11, 2007

Mixed bag

Well my foot held up during today's' race but it hurts now. I had a bad first 10 kms still nursing a big hangover from the night's before BBQ. You know I've never got drunk the night before a race so at the time I thought it would be OK ;)

Anyway it wasn't OK and I was so dry the first half and couldn't get into a comfortable rhythm. But somehow at the 13km mark I came good and ran my second half really well I seemed to be getting stronger and faster from the 13th K on right up until the 20th K when a lady of about 60 years (The eventual 2nd place woman's winner) flew by me and I couldn't catch her.

My time was 1:31:15. I'm a little disappointed with that as I should have done better given the conditions today. It was 19 degrees and no wind to cause problems and apart from ten minutes at the end it didn't rain. I was thinking on the way home that I just have to toughen up my training if I want any more PBs, more harder runs at pace and a bit more consistency. These PB don't come easy, you know.

On a brighter note I went to see a pro soccer game with my sons after the run today and our local team "Cerezo Osaka" won 4 to 0. We will take that ;)

Wednesday, November 07, 2007

Run from reality!

I'm running a half marathon this Sunday. This race is special to me for several reasons and it's a bit of a love hate thing. It was the first time I'd ever raced. I trained for about 5 months and did this race and 4 years later and I'm still running races regularly with no end in sight. So for this reason I love it and I do it every year. Also it's a fast half and I hold my current half marathon PB there.

What I'm not so thrilled about is that it has been cold and rained every year on this particular day since the first one I did here and it's at time of writing this forecast to rain again this year! It usually blows a gale too as it runs up and back along a river. You might think, "Oh a river that sounds lovely" but the old Yodo river is not a very scenic affair and the only time you might "Oh" is when you see a animal carcass float by.

It seems that some races are like this either they are always held in perfect conditions or they are always held in crappy weather. Still, I won't give this race up as sure enough the day a decide to not run it it will be 15 degrees sunny with a light breeze.

On another related note, my ankle is still not better and I now regret entering the last 10K race as it was not 100% when I ran this race but I did it anyway and I've aggravated it to the point that it has interrupted my preparation for this half and I will go into this Sundays race a little underdone and still a little lame.

Anyways, you might say I'm a little lame brained to be doing this and I'd agree. I would say to anyone of you, "take it off and save yourself for the next race", (mine is a full marathon on the end of December). but I can't bear to miss this race and the injury is more of a niggle than anything. One day it seems fine and next day, not so much ;(

Well it hasn't stopped me from running my normal runs this week and I'm betting that a few days rest before and the atmosphere on the day will have me pumped up enough to run a good race, even if it's not a PB.

This brings me to my song of the week from the German Punk band "Oxymoron." We are all sometimes a bit oxymoronish, I reckon. Song title: "Run from reality" exactly what I`ll be doing this weekend ;)