Two pronged blog post. 1. We are heading off for the first snow trip of the season shortly – oh the anticipation! 2. I want to talk briefly about pacing and how much it can impact on a run (completely unrelated to the post title, I realise. But seriously, how could I resist after the photo I got of our cat?!).
Now the admin is out of the way, lets get to business.
1. SNOOOWWWW!!
Well, there is apparently SOME snow in any case, covering PART of a SMALL mountain…but hey, snow is snow right? We have the chance to crash on a couch at the snow in the next week and we would be crazy to pass it up…except for the fact that it is school holidays (therefore, the slopes will be PACKED) and VERY early season. So more people on less snow. Blerk, not ideal. But we are going to make the absolute best of it. I intend to work on my technique (avoiding people packed onto the snow will be good practice) and might even try and put my worst foot forward, i.e. instead of boarding goofy (right foot down the slope) I will try a bit of au natural (left foot down the mountain).
We may be a wee bit excited, all the snow gear is laid out ready on the bed many days in advance. I think I have a budding snowboarder on our hands, what do you think kitten? Keen for the snow?
Cat in my hat (OK, helmet) and our boards ready to go
2. Pacing
I ran with a yet undiscovered pacing champion for whom I now personally believe that pacing is his (very mild) superpower. My husband and I went for a run together last night and I smashed my 10 km time – 10 km in 1 hour and 3 minutes, BOOM baby! And even better, it is EXACTLY on-pace for my goal City2Surf time. This was no accident, I told hubby I wanted to do C2S in 90 minutes, which is approximately a pace of 6 min 30 s per km. So using his phone running app which has a very short averaging period he kept track of our speed and kept me running at the required speed the whole time! Up hills we lost speed so he determined what speed we would need on the downhill and we picked it up. I think it was the first run I have done where I didn’t use the downhill parts as a breather but actually pushed it and ran my guts out the whole time. Keeping on pace was extremely motivating with hubby saying, ‘OK we have 1 minute 20 second to run 300 m and stay on pace, so just keep going like this and we’ll be on target’ and ‘we need to race down this hill to make up for the slower pace’ or ‘smack on, good speed hon’. Last time I ran with him was kind of horrible, he told me I ran so slow it physically hurt him, but this time I kept up and it was only a little bit slower than he would have run it. Now THAT is frickin progress!
We did three circuits of our neighbourhood ( including two hills and two flatish sections which was a good combination) and by the third one I was feeling it. I tried to pin-point exactly what was hurting for future work but couldn’t. Possibly my core, my shoulders were starting to droop and breathing was a little difficult towards the end, especially after the last hill climb. I have HUGE blisters on the bottom of both my big toes by the end but otherwise felt pretty good. I didn’t even really feel it today so I have gotten a pretty big boost for City2Surf, I might ACTUALLY be able to do this!!
Some AOB (Any Other Business, not on the agenda my apologies), yoga has been going well but I have not managed to do it regularly enough for my liking. I had wanted to do it every night after the gym or a run but it just doesn’t work that way. When I get home from the gym, its time to cook dinner, or eat dinner that hubby has just cooked or sit with him and chat (yep, pretty much blaming it on hubby). I can’t relax and do a nice yoga session that way. So instead I am planning on doing it in the morning after my walk. I will soon have more time in the mornings so should be able to squeez in a 30 minute walk and 20 minute yoga session. I don’t think Melvs will mind the reduced walkies time, I run him so much I actually wonder if it’s a bit hard on his paws or if it might not be detrimental to him later in his life in terms of doggy arthritis etc. I know, he’s meant to be a working dog (Australian Cattle Dogs were bred for running all day long) but I want him to be around as long as we can have him! I don’t want to run him into the ground.
Also, I have decided that either late this year or in next years season I am going to do a half marathon. No biggie, just running 21km – as you do 😉
run bike board live 