From Bruny Ultra to Derby Half

Thursday, 13^th December, 2018:

It’s been a week and a half since the Bruny Island ultra marathon and I have felt as if I have been recovering well. For a few days after the event I jogged/ran the steps and along the beach at The Neck to check my recovery process and was pleased with how I could run the steps faster and faster each succeeding day. My effort at Geeveston parkrun the following Saturday wasn’t my best as I gradually faded over the course. I did, however, run a few younger people home and encouraged them to sprint, though I couldn’t keep up with them. I’ve had a couple of runs since then and today I received an updated running plan which Ben has put together for me to incorporate Derby, Gone Nuts and Dove Lake, all within 5 weeks of each other. After he questioned me about my recovery from Bruny and the training in the weeks before he suggested that I could run the half marathon at Derby, but not to treat it as a race in light of the Gone Nuts 50k the following Saturday. And he does want me to do more training on trails in preparation for those events. So today I jogged to the pool and did a couple of easy paced circuits on the sawdust tracks.

Friday, 14^th December:

Today I made a fantastic discovery. Val and I decided to drive out to Warrawee Reserve at Latrobe so she could walk and I could run the old road into the picnic area that had been destroyed by the floods over two years ago. But what a change has taken place since we were there last time. The old picnic area remains non-existent but there is a mountain bike trail complex that is being constructed—not only at Warrawee but also at Railton (due in May 2019) and they will be joined together and then with construction around Kimberly starting in May 2019. After running Shale Road and back I decided to take the walking track that led me through the old Tramway cutting and onto various trails. I had the time of my life but was concerned that Val might be getting concerned as I was taking longer to get back than I had planned. In trying to take a short cut back to the carpark I actually ended up running further than planned. I’m going to enjoy these tracks as part of my preparation for Derby. I just hope that Railton is open before we head to the Mainland.

Thursday, 20^th December:

In my desire to progress faster around Australia I have been following Ben’s plan but sometimes adding a bit to it here and there—maybe that should be a big bit here and there. And having so enjoyed the Wild Mersey trails I went out again on Monday (my normal long run day) and then yesterday with Danika. In hindsight, three runs over those trials in less than a week might have been a bit too much in these early stages of fully recovering from Bruny. I have a bit of ankle, leg and hip soreness but because I am only such a short distance behind one of our great young runners in our virtual journey across the Northern Territory to Tennant Creek I am maybe just adding a bit too much to my scheduled runs. But catching those in front is what encourages and inspires me to keep going in the attempt to overtake them. Anyway, I’ve thought about keepng my Monday long runs to the courses around Devonport that I normally use and make my Wild Mersey trails on a Wednesday before RunClub. I’ve also set myself the goal of trying to run every Tasmanian parkrun (which has been achieved) before our trip to the Mainland AND volunteering at each of them as well as having a Freedom Run at each venue. That gives me only five months to get all this done. At the moment I still have eight Freedom Runs and eleven volunteer positions to complete.

Saturday, 1^st January, 2019:

I’ve continued to battle soreness in various parts of my legs, but it just seems that rest is the only guaranteed response. But if I take too much time off and don’t keep up my schedule then I won’t be ready for Derby, Gone Nuts or Cradle—and there isn’t that much time left to get myself ready. With the death of my much-loved mother-in-law in Victoria my schedule of long runs has been further affected over the Christmas-New Year period and I’m struggling to know whether to ignore those times I have missed a run or to try and catch up—but the Catch 22 situation is that I could overload myself and cause further soreness by trying to catch up. Since Bruny I’ve noticed a loss of speed but I seem to be picking it up a bit at the moment in parkruns. I want to keep them all less than 25 minutes if possible. It didn’t quite work out that way today with the NYD Double as Bairnsdale was 24:57 but Lakes Entrance was 25:02, but I did commence Lakes Entrance quite slowly (getting caught in a traffic jam for the first few hundred metres). My goal, then, was those in front of me—could I catch them? I slowly reeled in quite a number of them and was pleasantly surprised by my time. When I combined the two parkruns to make 10k the total time was staggering in that it was over 3:30 faster than my best effort at the 10k distance. Gotta be happy with that, even if I can’t maintain the pace for a full 10k.

Monday, January 14^th:

The last couple of weeks have been a mixed bag. At times I’ve felt flat and then I have put in some good times—and today was one of those days for the Strava segment “Get out of the Pool”, which is from Devonport Aquatic Centre and up Steele Street. I equalled my PB for that segment so I might be getting some speed back after Bruny. In talking to a couple of people at Monday Mates I mentioned my lack of speed and one of them said that it would take a good six weeks to recover from Bruny, which is where I am now. So I’ll see how I go over the next few weeks in the lead up to both Derby and Gone Nuts.

Wednesday, January 16^th:

I certainly didn’t feel like going out to run the Wild Mersey trails today. It’s been hot and I’m not one who is too keen on snakes when running so I opted for the old “The Need for Hills” standby. After uploading to Strava I discovered that I had a PB on three hill segments so I’m confident that I might be starting to return to my best running, though I shall wait until I have a couple of runs at parkrun. I was still able to cover about 6.6 km at RunClub after the hills, so that was pleasing.

Thursday, January 17^th:

A couple of weeks ago I found myself thinking that I couldn’t care if I never ran again. Well, I certainly didn’t feel like that today. I decided on running three laps of the College Loop and it felt as if I was floating along. Initially, I wanted to run fast and set a course PB but opted out of that at the start of the run because of last night’s strong effort on the hills. It wasn’t until my second attempt at running up Surrey Street that I began to feel the strain from last night and I started to question the wisdom of three 3k laps. But once I had reached the top and settled into a comfortable stride that thought vanished from my mind. Surprisingly, the third run up Surrey Street didn’t feel as bad as the previous one. It was only when my watch vibrated at 8 km that I looked at my times and found that I was travelling quite well so I quickened my pace for the final run home and ended up running a 3:20 course PB. What was amazing was that I hadn’t even been trying to run fast and yet my attempts at the “Surrey Climb” segment were my second and third fastest ever (out of 23 efforts). I’m now looking forward to this year’s events with eager anticipation.

Monday, January 28^th:

Today was such a different story, though. I’ve had a few strong runs since my last entry with good times. But perhaps it all caught up with me for today’s long run. I was scheduled to run for 3 hours so deliberately started off at a slow pace. Within a few kilometres the pace had quickened to around 6:15/k, so I slowed it down a bit. By the time I had reached the halfway mark I was beginning to tire and as I turned I felt the full force of a strong wind that certainly didn’t help me at all. I began to walk in places and my running dropped off dramatically to a jog—but I kept on until I decided to cut the session short. Painfully I made my way up Steele Street and finally made it home in 2½ hours for just over 20 kms. Hopefully today’s running performance was affected by the last few days rather than anything else. If it’s more that I’m getting older and finding that my recovery is taking longer, then I could be in trouble for Gone Nuts only one week after Derby. I found myself thinking that maybe I should just limit myself to parkrun and forget about anything longer. While we’re travelling on the Mainland in 4 months time I don’t think that I will find many events, other than parkrun, to enter. So maybe that could be a good thing—but then I will miss the longer events. We’ll just have to wait and see how I handle next Monday’s 3½ hour planned run.

Monday, 4^th February:

After last Monday’s difficulty in completing my long run I was determined that today’s effort would be more successful, especially as it was for 3½ hours. However, from the outset I decided that I would make it just 30 kms rather than the specified time. With two bottles of Staminade and a handful of jelly babies—having already had breakfast and my mugs of tea—I set off up the hill to the beginning of the bike track. It had to be a slow start and the first kilometre ticked over at 7:19 but my mind was already working overtime. I was thinking of the 30 km course along the track out to Spreyton and what I would have to do to set a PB over that distance—thinking that my best was maybe around 3:30 (that was roughly the time for my first run out there whereas my best time was actually 3:17:25). That’s definitely not the approach to take if I want to complete today’s run in good shape at the end. By the time I had reach 2.5 km I was again beginning to think that the days of long runs were over. My legs felt heavy and I didn’t know how far I would be able to get today. But my pace, now that I had been running downhill and on the flat, had quickened yet again without my being too conscious of it and I was now running at 6:10-6:15/k pace. After 4 km my times quickened even further and from there until around 20 km it was around or under 6:00/k, which was way too fast. I was tiring; my legs were hurting—I wonder why? But I made up my mind that I wasn’t going to give up this time, no matter how much it hurt. With a couple of exceptions my pace dropped to 6:30/k or slower, with the last few kilometres a real struggle and my final kilometre being 8:52. I had been questioning my ‘mental toughness’ to actually continue at my earlier pace, for my mind did wander quite often. Throughout the run I had frequently used my Staminade and chewed on a few jelly babies, though I obviously hadn’t had enough to get me through the run in good shape—so maybe I should have thrown a few gels in as well. My brother-in-law, Bruce, has given me some good advice on how much I need to take in the way of fluids, gels and jelly babies—now I just need to follow it. But I did complete the run and even had a 1:50 PB from March 2014—the last time I successfully completed that run. At least I know that I can cover the distance for Derby, but there were no hills to speak of that I had to climb today.

Friday, 8^th February:

Because we were travelling to Hobart taking three grandchildren back to Franklin after their evacuation because of the fires I missed yesterday’s 10 km run. Thus I combined yesterday’s run with today’s 6 km and opted to run the Clarence Foreshore Trail and then over the Tasman Bridge and a bit of the Intercity Bicycle Track. I ended up doing 18.35 km and had a fabulous run, averaging 6:10/k over a combination of rough track, bitumen, concrete and the steel plating over the bridge. Even with what I had already run during the week and with a hard physio session on Wednesday I was really pleased with my effort as I didn’t realise how fast I was going at times. I did give some thought to Derby and how I have to run more slowly so I neither crash out like I did two years ago or ruin my chances for Gone Nuts. They are getting awfully close but at least I am feeling more confident than I did a couple of weeks ago.

Sunday, 10^th February:

With a family birthday lunch at Port Huon tomorrow and then our travelling back to Devonport I took up Val’s suggestion of having my long run today rather than trying to squeeze it in tomorrow or postponing it until Tuesday. That meant I had had no rest day prior to my 4 hour run—especially necessary following my numerous Strava achievements and course PB’s over the previous six days. So I set out along the inaptly named—inaptly named for serious trail runners—Clarence Foreshore Trail. It did have some trail-like conditions at the Geilston Bay end and a bit of gravel as part of the Bellerive parkrun course, but most of it was concrete or bitumen. I was looking at running around 6.30/k and had the intention of walking the hills in preparation for Derby and Gone Nuts. Apart from 500 ml of water all I carried were two protein bars which I would take at the 1½ and 3 hour marks. Not sufficient at all, but this was a last minute decision to run. I was a bit slower than my planned time, but this was just a training run and it felt hot. Kunanyi/Mt Wellington was covered in clouds that seemed to be releasing rain and all around were lovely clouds but I was running in sunshine—not what I wanted at 2.30 pm. I plodded on and slowed to a longish walk while I ate the first of my protein bars. My return on the out and back route was a bit more difficult. Not only did I slow but the wind came up—the clouds were coming over but the wind made it all that more difficult for me as my legs began to tire. My pace dropped and I started to walk more than just the hills. A lady jogger in her senior years, still probably younger than I am, ran passed. I tried to keep up but I found that I could do so only momentarily. The upshot was that I ran for 4:24:15 and covered 33.62 km. However, last Monday I did 30.05 km in 3:15:34, so today’s extra 3.57 km took me an extra 68 minutes. In light of my activities and times over the previous six days and today’s wind I’m not overly disappointed. But I did find myself again questioning my mental toughness (as people call it) to push on when the going gets tough and the legs begin to ache.

Friday, 15^th February:

Well, tomorrow was supposed to be the day when I put in a harder effort at parkrun but, as they were short of volunteers, I’m now the photographer. As a result I decided, after an easy Friday Fresh jogging/walking with Val, to have a hard run on the track starting from the pool. I was still feeling uncomfortable with the pain in the right side of my ribcage (I’m wondering if I cracked a rib or two when crawling into the tunnel of the caravan to empty it out so I could weigh everything). It’s been hard to sleep and I found at RunClub that it was a bit of a stabbing pain when running downhill and breathing. Anyway, I went for an easy warm up run to get there and then took off for 4k—being 2k out and then back. I actually felt no pain at all while running flat out—at least to the 1k mark whereupon I slowed down for a bit before taking off again. It was a pleasing run at pace and I took 1:32 off that course record from way back in February 2009. That’s my last hard run before Derby so, with the tapering during the week, I’m hoping to be ready for tomorrow week’s run.

Saturday, 16^th February:

I didn’t sleep well at all last night because of the pain. I finally got some sleep when I used three pillows to be half sitting up. Late this afternoon I went out for a run but immediately I started my slow warm up I knew that I was in a bit of trouble. It hurt to both breathe and jog. Anyway, I kept on and managed 7 km and it did become easier as the pain gradually eased over the course of the run and I was able to increase my speed to the point where I averaged 7:33/k. From that point on I was so much better for most of the night and relatively free from pain, though it is still very sore to touch. Dr. Google tells me that, for broken ribs, it takes around 6 weeks for full healing to take place and that one should refrain from sport. If I did that then I would not be able to participate in Derby, Gone Nuts or Dove Lake. So I’m taking my chances that nothing serious has happened and running, even if it remains sore for these next two runs.

Monday, 25^th February:

What a great weekend it’s been. On Friday, Val and I spent time walking around Derby Lake; down to the old Town Hall to register for my run; to the pizza place for lunch and then to our respective spots for marshalling duty for the Dash for Cash. That clocked up some 14k, which was a lot more than I expected. That night my pain was quite a bit and, like the previous night, I didn’t sleep very well at all. To make matters worse both hips were quite sore. None of which was great preparation for Saturday’s run. It was only when the alarm went at 6.00 am that I groggily jumped out of bed to eat a large bowl of cereal with a banana on top and have three mugs of tea. But it left me feeling a bit sluggish. Anyway, we drove down to the starting area giving ourselves plenty of time to park the car as close as possible to where Val would be marshalling and taking photos. That way she could access things that she wanted. We watched the marathon runners take off and then waited and chatted until it was our turn for a briefing before we moved to the start for our event. How would I go, especially with sore hips and hammies? In line with my instructions to make this a run and not a race I kept closer to the rear of the field. Darlene joined me as she wanted an easy run before next Saturday as well. I was finding myself feeling a bit queasy from breakfast and was wondering how I would get through the run. If Darlene hadn’t been there to keep encouraging me and checking on how I was I might have taken off too fast at the beginning or slowed right down in the early stages. It wasn’t long before she was in front of me and, at times, the invisible cord between us was broken and I had to apply extra effort to catch her again. Still Darlene kept on checking how I was and even offered to slow down if that would help me. She was truly wonderful in her care for me. A number of people who started slower than we had began to overtake us. After a short while Kelly and Tess joined us and we ran together from there on in. What wonderful company I had. We jogged along the stone wall; walked the hills; and admired the scenery we passed through. The lake sparkled. Its reflections were so beautiful. It was getting on to 9 km and still we hadn’t reached the first of the aid stations. But then it appeared and we helped ourselves to a few things to sustain us. I was still sticking to my plan of having a gel at every 5 km and nibbling some jelly babies every now and then. I was only carrying 1 litre of made up Powerade and, as the first one was close to being finished, I topped that bottle up with water. Yes, it was diluted but I needed the fluid. When we approached the 15 km point I was about to have another gel but, being at the second of the aid stations, I decided to not take it, topping up instead on a few things that they had on offer. It meant emptying my bottle and filling it with Coke that, when I commenced running again, soon lost most of its fizz. At around 17 km I upped my pace, knowing that I was almost home. I noticed that Kelly started to come with me, but she opted to stay with the others as they had been running together for most of the race. I was surprised at how well I could still run and soon passed a number of those who were in front of me. Up the last switch backs and I could see Derby ever so clearly. I was almost home and still I was able to improve my pace to a low of 7:17/k, with my last split at 6:28/k. I’d run my race with great encouragement from Darlene, Kelly and Tess, but still my morning wasn’t over. I turned around and ran back 450 metres to find the girls and run home with them. Quite emotional. But where was Gosso? We had been expecting him for some time, but he still hadn’t finished. So it was back down the track—much more slowly this time. But he was nowhere to be found, so I turned around and went back to Val. After he did appear and we watched him successfully complete his marathon I drove back to the van for a shower and change. My day was over, or so I thought, so I left my watch there and went to pick up pizzas for those who were still hanging around. Time passed slowly, especially for one anxious husband whose wife hadn’t appeared. Still we waited until there was only one thing left to do. I jogged/walked back along the trail, checking with those who were still on their way as to the lady in question. After over three quarters of an hour I found her and the sweep happily making their way to the finish. So we walked and jogged and chatted and laughed the whole way back. At least I had my phone and so kept Val (and, through her, the race organiser and the anxious husband up to date on where we were) until they could see us. That night Val and I again took up marshalling duties (Val also had her camera) for the night run. Volunteering, which also means cheering on the competitors, is such great fun, and I would recommend more people to participate in this way. Sadly, we won’t be able to participate next year as we will be on the Mainland.