So far so good this week. I had a great run on Tuesday, and then I actually went out for another one on Wednesday. (I’m trying to increase up to four runs per week.) My legs felt pretty sore afterwards, so I decided it was time to call in a specialist. I did a Google search for recommended massage therapists for runners in Sydney and turned up This CoolRunning messageboard thread. On the basis of that, I rang Coby at Muscle Medicine and booked in for a session this morning. After he heard the history of my aches and pains, he had a look at my running shoes and my posture. The verdict is that I have a slight twist when I stand and run, tilting my left hip towards the front. This in turn caused my left quad injury, and my dodgy hamstrings, and my tense shoulders, and all kinds of stuff I never suspected. “So what do we do to fix it?” I asked. Coby just flexed his fingers ominously. Oops. He gave me the massage of my life. He actually spent most of the time on my back, telling me that it’s no good focusing on my legs if I’m just going to re-injure them again. Fair enough. He warned me that my back is going to be covered in bruises, and that his patients’ spouses are often surprised when they see them! The real pain came when he moved onto my hamstrings. Ow. Ow. Ow. I felt pretty good afterwards though, and I’m hoping to be recovered enough tomorrow to go for a run. I also asked him about the whole stretching issue, since – after reading Galloway – I haven’t been doing it. He agrees with that course of action for me, saying that I seem to have a decent amount of mobility, and what would benefit me more is core strengthening. I guess it’s time to book in those swim lessons, right?

Well, I was bound to have a bad week eventually. I went out for my first run on Tuesday intent on increasing my running time by 10% to 28 minutes. I only made it about half that. I just felt so tired and run-down. Later that night, I was getting into the shower when I felt a sudden twang of pain in my left quad. Crap. An injury ON TOP of a bad run. I decided to give myself some time off. I spent the next three days icing my leg and rubbing it down with Voltarin. I saw my doctor on Friday and asked whether there were any anti-inflammatories that were safe for my stomach. Ibuprofen and other NSAIDS are a no-go for me, but he gave me a prescription for a new type that’s supposed to be gentler. On Saturday, I gingerly headed out for a run. I just did laps around the park (so I wouldn’t be too far away from home if it started hurting), and I tried to take small steps (shuffling, really) as much as possible. Basically, I took it easy. HOWEVER, I managed to last the whole 28 minutes and my leg felt fine. A little wobbly there at the end, but no significant pain. I took one of the new pills when I got home and that seemed to help a bit too. So it seems this week might not be the setback I feared it would be!

Today was the start of my fifth week of training. I’ve now been running regularly (as in, 3 times a week) for more than a month now, and I think I’ve turned a corner.* Running makes me feel good. It made me feel good before, but only in the “I’ve done something I hate and now I’m all tired but at least I feel kinda virtuous” way. But this morning, after another 25 minute non-stop jog with hills, I actually felt MORE energized at the end of the run than I did at the beginning. I felt like I could’ve kept going. I was actually happy, you know, in my head. It was seriously weird.

I finished reading Jeff Galloway’s Women’s Guide to Running last night. Quite a lot of the book is devoted to pointing out WHY you should run, which was wasted on me (since I’m “already there,” so to speak). I bought it for the practical information, and I found a few tips in there that I think are going to make an immediate impact. One of them is the recommendation that you have a cup of coffee about an hour before you run. THIS IS GENIUS. I feel so much more “peppy” and alert with a little caffeine. Another mindblowing idea for me is the admonition to take smaller steps. I’m tall, so my natural inclination is to take bigger strides when I try to speed up. This is a bad idea, and it often leads to injuries. (This is how I hurt my hamstring last year.) But by taking smaller, faster steps, I can speed up without overstriding and hurting myself! I’ve also stopped feeling guilty about not stretching religiously. Galloway says he thinks stretching tends to hurt more than it helps, so unless you’ve got a specific injury that requires it, you don’t really need to do it. I like that.

Oh! And I recorded a new “personal best” in the mile on Saturday. I broke eleven minutes! I know that’s not fast for most of you (and my teenage self would’ve laughed), but I felt really proud of that. I’ve been trying to run a ten-minute mile for more than five years now and I haven’t reached it yet. This time, I really think I’m going to get there.

* This morning’s euphoria may have been partially due to it being a much cooler and less humid run than I’ve had in the past month. I think it’ll only get better as we head into Autumn…

25 minutes, non-stop. At race pace. With hills. In the pouring rain. KRISTY FOR THE WIN.

Boy, I haven’t done one of these in a long time, have I? After taking some time off during the whole “buying and moving house” thing, I’m back onto the running with a vengeance. As of today, it’s officially 18 weeks til the Sydney Half Marathon, and I’ve just completed my third week of training. I’m basing my efforts on Hal Higdon’s training plan. Since that’s a 12-week program, I’m using these extra weeks at the beginning to build up my fitness and ease myself into the routine. (I’m very wary of my troublesome left hamstring.) So far I’ve been taking it easy, using the Couch to 5K podcasts to structure my runs and keep me from pushing too hard. I’m happy to report that it’s working! Yesterday I did my longest run since the City 2 Surf: twenty minutes without a break. I know it doesn’t sound like much, but it felt so great to be able to do it and not feel like I was injuring myself. I’m not even sore today! And I’ve got Max challenging me with the Nike+iPod, so the competitive angle is helping.

My only fear with regards to the actual race is the cutoff time. All runners have to make it through the first 11K in less than 70 minutes or you get diverted to the finish line on a shortcut and don’t get an official time. My goal, therefore, is to make this cutoff time. That’s totally doable, right? I’m just going to consider the 11K marker as my real finish line, and as long as I make the cutoff, I’ll be happy even if I have to walk the entire second half of the race.

The Snook and I staggered out into the early morning light today for a bit of running… along with 20,000 other people. We caught the train to Milsons Point and joined the crowd waiting for the start of our second 9K Bridge Run. (Last year’s blog post.) It was cool in the shade, but the sun was warm and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. Soon we were off. We did pretty well getting up onto the bridge, and going downhill onto the Cahill Expressway is always fun. We hit the first drinks station at 3.5km, and that’s where I somehow lost the Snook. It was rather unbelievable really. I mean, we’re both giants and we were both wearing bright red baseball caps, but somehow he’d just vanished. I persevered onwards. I hit the 5K mark at about 33:00, so I was on track for the same pace as last year. Unfortunately that’s where the course veers into the Domain, and I ran into some serious trouble on those hills. It’s not just that my legs felt like rubber; for the first race ever, I was actually having some significant chafing issues. I’m pretty sure I wore the same shorts in the City 2 Surf, but today they were just KILLING ME. So I ended up walking a fair bit of the latter half of the course. Once I got back out onto the main road with a straight shot to the Opera House, I picked up the pace. My speed was also helped by the fact that I passed right by Julian from The Chaser standing at the side of the road with a bloke with a video camera, and nothing motivates like the fear of the entire nation seeing your chubby butt walking towards the finish line. I crossed the line at 62:00, which is about four minutes or so slower than last year. I can live with that. I found the Snook not long after, and we had a laugh at discovering that he’d only finished two minutes before me. We must’ve been within sight of each other the whole time yet somehow I never found him. I’m happy to report that the post-race organisation was much better this time, and it didn’t take us long to turn in our timing chips and receive our medals. Unfortunately none of the buses were running yet (because the marathon was still going) so we had to walk the whole way home. Dudes, my thighs KILL.

Remember how my friend Holli’s husband was running an ultra-marathon (50 miles!) to raise money for lupus? Well, HE DID IT! Congratulations, Brian! I can’t even imagine how tired he must feel today. If you’re a slack-ass like me and you forgot to donate, you can still contribute. (He’s really close to reaching his funding goal.)

I occasionally get e-mails from people from my high school class, most of whom are just idly Googling and stumble across my site. They say “hey,” and I say “hey,” and that’s that. Not long ago though, I heard from someone I used to be good friends with: Holli Wallace.* Holli wanted to ask me a favor. She and her husband Brian have family and friends with lupus, so Brian is running a fifty-mile ultramarathon next month to raise money for the Lupus Foundation of America. (I can’t even begin to fathom how hard that would be. That’s SIX TIMES farther than my farthest run ever. Insane.) Brian’s set up a weblog to document his training and help raise awareness of the cause. Holli asked if I would mind throwing them a link… and duh, of course I will. In fact, I’ll be donating some cash as well. So if you need an excuse to do a good deed this month, go donate at Brian’s site, okay?

* Incidentally, I have a great photo of Holli that I took on our 8th grade camping trip to Pokagon, where she’s lying on the beach and looking back upside-down at me. I always thought it would make a great album cover. Man, I should find that and e-mail it to her…

City 2 Surf Photos – The Agony and the Ecstasy
Last night I suddenly remembered that the City 2 Surf photos were available, so I looked up our bib numbers to see what they had. The first one of me was pretty good, with me chugging along and half of the Snook visible on the side. The second one? Not so good. In fact, I laughed and laughed and laughed. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Funniest. Running Pose. Ever.  

Let’s be honest. I look like I’m in the Special Olympics in that second one. I actually remember the moment quite clearly. The guy was right at the end, standing literally at the finish line. The Snook and I were urging each other on in a sprint to finish strong. “Photographers!” I gasped. “Put your arms up!” he said. And this is what happened. WHAT AM I DOING? I couldn’t even manage a proper wave. Well, you try running eight miles and see if you photograph well at the end of it!

City 2 Surf 2007
Old American Guy: Excuse me. I just flew into Sydney today. Is there a race on or something?
Me: Yep. The City 2 Surf. Largest fun run in the world.
Him: Where does it go?
Me: From in the city here all the way out to Bondi Beach. It’s like more than 8 miles. And hey, you sound like me!
Him: Where are you from?
Me: Indiana.
Him: Did you fly all the way here just for this race??

I wish I’d said, “Yeah, I’m the favorite to win.” But instead I said, “No, I live here. I’m just waiting now for my husband to pick up his stupid race number.”

Anyway, the Snook got his number and we took our positions in the Back of the Pack. (Last year we started in an earlier group, but the Snook had left his registration too late this year. So we were in the big group with the walkers and the strollers and the freaks in gorilla suits.) The gun went off and it probably took us twenty minutes just to get up to the starting line. We were literally in the last 500 people (out of more than 64,000) to start the race. I’ll tell you what though – running with the fatties and the babies sure makes you feel like you’re flying! We ran pretty much all the way to the tunnel at the end of Williams Street. After that, we alternated between jogging on the flat and downhill sections, and brisk walking on the hills. We passed thousands of people. In Double Bay I was thrilled to see the same 80’s hair band rockin’ out on the pub roof as they did last year. We made an effort to use the drinks stations more this year (it was a beautiful, hot sunny day) and I was checking our pace pretty frequently with the Nike+ iPod kit. Heartbreak Hill was hard, but mentally I was just so much more prepared this year. (At one point, Rodd commented that “This is where you pretty much broke down last year.” I laughed and started jogging again.) We were both hurting on our descent into Bondi, and I’d been nursing a mild stitch since the 3km mark. But we persevered. The Snook knew just how to motivate me, letting me set the pace and pointing out other racers that he knew I would hate to let beat me, like the “Peaky Striders” (a walking group of old women in bright orange shirts who kicked my butt at several events last year) and the inevitable dork in a gorilla suit. We sprinted the last bit to the finish line, raising our arms for what should (hopefully) be a pretty awesome photograph. Our revised goal for the day had been to average less than ten minutes a kilometer, and thanks to all the jogging we did, we pretty much smashed it. The iPod registered a time of 2:01:30, which works out to a pace of 8:48 per kilometer. So that’s a little slower than last year, but better than expected considering our injuries and lack of training. Getting home was the usual headache of endless queues and bus rides, and we stumbled in nearly six hours after we’d left. After a shower and a sandwich, I was off to the masseuse for some much needed relaxation… And now we’re both dealing with the inevitable aches and pains. But we did it!