Spur of the Moment

In a spur of the moment, I made the decision and entered the Hall Block Humdinger!  It's an 11km off road event.  Actually it is the end of the big North Range Traverse that I am planning on running next year (Here is the link to it).  I wasn't going to enter but a friend is walking the distance and I keep on seeing people talking about it so thought I would give it a go too.  I'm really excited!  Now to train for the next 39 days to get strong for it.

Developing my plan

So as I said after the Wellington half marathon - I plan to work on building up my strength.  Why is this so important and what am I going to do to achieve this?

First - I plan on running my first full marathon in 2018.  In May of that year to be exact because I have chosen Rotorua to be the one and only marathon that I will run in my life,  Why Rotorua?  Because I have a friend who has run it every year for the past few years and I always get a sense of jealously when I see her photos from the event and I love reading about the amazing run that it is.  I also have another friend who lives not far from there and who will run with me for the distance of the marathon and help me through those tough times.  Going to Rotorua to run has been on my bucket list for a little while now so why not make it really count!  Plus if I run it in 2018 then I can say I have completed a full marathon before I hit that ripe old age of 40.  Yes, that gives me well over 18 months to work towards this goal but there is a reason for giving myself a long build in.  It doesn't mean I will give up on my goal sometime next year and say it is all too hard.  It means I can put some steps in to make it a more enjoyable experience.

I know that Rotorua has hills in it.  I know that a marathon involves finding that slower pace and just keeping on going.  I know that I really need to build some strength and this is the reasoning behind the two events I have chosen to partake in next year.

My first event will be heading back to Waitarere to complete the Great Forest Run half marathon.  I have really enjoyed this event in the past two years and it does work your body.

My second event will be one I just learnt about this year - a 25km course that starts on the Pahiatua Track and runs through to the Manawatu Gorge.  Looking at it, it does look hard BUT that is what I need.  I need a run where I am not focused on time.  It will be a run that will make me stronger and make my legs work hard.  Yes I will be on them for quite some time but this is what running a full marathon will be like.

I know I have not met my sub 2 hour goal for a half marathon but this is going down on the bucket list.  For now, I want to look at challenging my body a little more in different ways.  I'm going to have to brave running some trails on my own.  But guess what, I am going to have fun while I am doing it all!

Stepping back to look forward

One thing that I didn't look back at and reflect on after the run on Sunday was my positives from the run.  I think I was a little guttered and wound up in the negatives from my run that I did look at the good.  So what are these goods?

*  This was half marathon number 6.  Why is this such a big deal - well I only started 'running' back in 2013!  This was the year I completed my first 10km, my first 15km and then went on to run my first half marathon in the December.  It is also my second half marathon for this year.  The other one was just back in April when I ran an off road half.
*  This year I managed to stay ahead of the pacer for a lot longer - last year I was past with around 9-10km to go.  This year, I stayed ahead of the pacer until around 5km to go!  This shows I did some strong running to begin with.
*  I had a goal of getting a photo of me smiling while running.  Yes, my husband has got photos like this for me before but always earlier in the race.  This year, it got them again BUT the professionals also got a photo of me smiling!  WIN.  As some friends also pointed out to me, there was an air shot of me - yep, I was running that strong at the time that both feet left the ground.
*  Lastly, I have proven to myself that I have it in me to keep on going and complete the 21km race.  The going got tough and I did want to give up a couple of times but I didn't.  I was strong and I did it.

So I am ready to move forward now and will leave you with this quote I love:

Wellington Half Marathon - Take Two

For probably the first time ever I slept the night before this half marathon.  My alarm even managed to wake me up rather than me laying there waiting for it to go off.  4;15 on a Sunday morning is a mighty earlier start but I wanted to go back to Wellington and I really wanted to better that time I had got the previous year.  A quick shower, then a banana and blueberry smoothie and we were ready to hit the road.  By the time we got to Otaki, I was ready for my latte.  6.15 in the morning, coffee in hand and a smile on my face.  I was ready for this day!

And while I am at it - check out those nails!  They were painted to match my running outfit for the day - green, black and silver.  Here's my outfit all laid out and ready the night before:

From Otaki, we continued the drive into Wellington and arrived with plenty of time to spare.  I went and collected my race number, and started to get myself all ready for the race.  While waiting, I received a text wishing me all the best and encouraging me to relax in the last hour leading up to the race.  The time went quite quickly and before I knew it, it was time to line up and head off.  I had thought about heading out with a pace group this time to see if I could meet that 2hr goal but decided I was going to give it one last shot on my own.  I started off with planning on running slower than my last half marathon at the beginning and this was the case.  Looking back at my splits, I kept a fairly consistent pace over those first 9km.  My husband had walked ahead to around the 3.5km mark to try and get some photos for me.  I'm so glad he did as he was unable to get finishing photos of me this year.  Decided I had better give him the thumbs up as I was feeling great at this stage and heading along well.

Even the wind had been fairly nice to me so far along, but coming up to that 10km mark and then the turn around point, the head wind came in, I slowed and it felt tough.  At the turn around point, I was still running strong and still on a good target to be back at the stadium in time to reach my goal.  I headed past the point where I remembered the pace group passing me this year and thinking they must be coming up behind me again soon but they weren't.  Heading back along the bays, I got patches of calm and patches of wind.  I had taken my beanie off long before now due to over heating but my hair was really annoying me.  I need to look into something else to sort my hair out for races like this one.  From the 14km mark I did start to slow.  With 5km to go I was still on target of my goal but then got past by the pace group.  In my head I couldn't get down as I still had a way to go so kept the positive thoughts and I was still running and I could better that time from last year!  I even managed to push through everything and up my pace again for a couple of km but then I feel apart a little.  My legs stopped, I walk, I ran again, I kept positive talking.  Then my goal of beating last year disappeared from in front of me too.  That last km of this race is really hard.  You feel like you should be at the end but you aren't.  And then there is the ramp back into the stadium to contend with.  I had been determined to run up that ramp this year but I had used everything out of me.  I walked it, then ran with everything left in me to that finish line.  I crossed it 2hr, 4min and 27sec after I crossed it the first time.  The race was over.  To say I wasn't guttered would be lying.  I had wanted to run better than I did today but I still needed to be proud of what I had achieved.  And I think the smile does show that pride (along with the pain!).

For the sixth time since December 2013 I had run a half marathon.  I think that as a mother of two that should be something to be proud of.  But I also know that I still have some work to do.  I know that I can make myself a stronger and more confident runner.  And that now, is my goal for the coming while.  No more races for now.  No running for this week.  And then I will look at building myself back up again.

The Month of May

What a month May was!  It was a month of taking a self imposed break for a week, a month of really looking at why I run and where I want to head.  I took part in my first Mother's Day Run and a very fast 5km.  It was also the first month this year when I didn't make it to my goal of running 100km in a month.  I got to 98km!!!  A little gutting not to have got those last 2km done but hey, that's just what happens sometimes.  I knew I was going to be close but not close enough so I made sure the last run was one that counted.  Why it wasn't a personal best or anything, I ran my heart out and got one of my best paces in a while.

Now for June and the month of my Wellington Half Marathon.  The blog will probably be quiet until after then so all take care.

The importance of listening to your body!

Following on from putting things into perspective for myself, this week I have also learnt about the importance of listening to my body.  So many times I have been warned about making sure I do not have a burn out and to make sure I get that rest I need.  This week I started with the goal in mind of just completing three 6km runs with no pressure on myself.  Well so far I have only completed one of those runs and it will be the only one I do achieve.  Why - because I need to listen to my body.  It is tired.  Like really, really tired!  It's had a feeling it hasn't had for a while.  I know I need to listen to it now.  I still have 5 weeks until Wellington and I am better off to give myself the rest it needs now than to keep on pushing through and going to Wellington very ill prepared and unwell.  To anyone else out there finding they just aren't thinking straight, things aren't working like they normally would or you are just really feeling overwhelmed - take a break.  It just might be the very thing you need!

Putting things into perspective

I think that sometimes I just need to put things into perspective again.  I need to go back to why I run and the enjoyment I get out of running.  See I have this half marathon coming up in just over a month.  People have been supporting me along on this journey and I keep hearing how well I am going in my running and just how well I am likely to go in this event.  For this reason I seem to have this time stuck in my head and totally focused on this.  It means I keep on thinking I'm not doing well enough in my training, I'm not going to meet this goal.  I need to turn this all around and think - look how far I have come, look at how I can get out and run, look at what I do!  This is me:

I'm hot, I'm sweaty, I have just completed a 6k run.  No music, no worrying about the time and finishing in the dark!  I need to remember the enjoyment I get from running and all the positives it is doing for me!

I decided all that time back to make that decision to try!  I have accomplished so much and I will continue to.  Running is a journey.  It hits speed bumps, it hits breaks in the road BUT ... it is a journey that I can take.