Robert Song's Running

I'm over 50 and been running off and on since 1968. I have run everything from 800m to 10k on the track, to half marathons (PB 1:21 Brisbane 1993) and marathons (PB 2:53 Gold Coast 1985).

Sunday, October 28, 2007

Leaving on a Jet Plane

22nd - 28th October
Mon 14.5k 1:15:19 @ 5:11 HR 139 75% MaxHR
Tue 7k 41:00 Treadmill HR 130 70% MaxHR
Wed Missed Session
Thu 14.5k 1:14:17 @ 5:07 HR 138 74% MaxHR
Fri 9.5k 49:12 @ 5:10 HR 135 72% MaxHR
Sat Rest
Sun 11.0k 58:05 @ 5:16 HR 144 77% MaxHR

Week: 56.5k
Oct: 200K
YTD: 2602k

This week I travelled down to Penrith for work on Tuesday. Managed to do just over 40 minutes on the treadmill at the hotel on Tuesday night. I was coming back Wednesday and had planned to arrive back to my workplace in Brisbane around 6:00pm and get in a run that night. Unfortunately, I took a wrong turn on the way to airport and arrived about ten minutes late for my flight and had to wait another 90 minutes for a flight. So on finally getting back to Brisbane I gave up the session for that night.

Since then both the temperature and humidity have both risen, resulting in some sticky running conditions. My Sunday run this morning was particularly uncomfortable. Leaving at 7:00am is just too late in this sort of weather for me. After having trained for the Canberra Marathon over the summer months for the last two years, my loathing of humidity is one of the main reasons I have targeted the Gold Coast in July rather than an earlier marathon. Allows me to cruise somewhat over the summer months without the pressure of 30K+ long runs.

Next week is going to be another challenge. Tomorrow afternoon I head down to Canberra for an early meeting on Tuesday. So will again be juggling work,travel and running.

Sunday, October 21, 2007

The Slow Build Up Begins

8th - 14th October

A nice easy week after the Marathon. Recovery has been good. The nail on my second toe of my right foot took a hammering in the Gold Coast Marathon in July and was just starting to grow back. It now is black again and imagine will fall off within the next month. Apart from that everything is fine.


Wed - 6.5k 36:58 @ 5:26 HR 127 68% MaxHR
Fri - 6.5k 34:18 @ 5:02 HR 141 76% MaxHR
Sun - 6.8k 31:37 @ 4:51 HR 148 79% MaxHr


15th - 21st October

It is now time to focus on the 2008 Gold Coast Marathon.
The plan is to start a five month base building phase which should take me up to March next year. No need to rush and I will be slowliy building up the Ks over that period and hopefully by the end be averaging over the 100k a week consistently.

Early on in the week it was very windy and later in the week it was cooler than it has been of late making for nice running conditions.

Mon - 9.5k 48:27 @ 5:06 HR 139 75% MaxHR
Tue - 9.5k 48:03 @ 5:03 HR 139 75% MaxHR
Wed - 6.8k 35:34 @ 5:13 HR 132 71% MaxHR
Thu - 9.5k 47:35 @ 5:00 HR 143 77% MaxHR
Fri - 14.5k 1:15:04 @ 5:10 HR 139 75% MaxHR
Sat - Rest
Sun - 15.3k 1:21:04 @ 5:20 HR 141 76% MaxHR

Week Total 65k
Oct Total 143k
Year Total 2545k

Tuesday, October 09, 2007

Melbourne Marathon 2007

Melbourne Marathon 7th October 2007

Time : 3:30:52 (Official Net Time)

Avg HR: 159 Max Hr : 177

Out : 1:45:47 Back: 1:45:05


The thought of finishing a marathon inside of the MCG grabbed my imagination after the Gold Coast this year. After allowing for a proper recovery from the Coast race, there was never going to be enough time to have a proper preparation so from the out set my only aim was not for a good time but to enjoy myself, soak up the atmosphere and take in that final lap.


The flu in August didn't make for an ideal preparation. That was a week of absolutely no running and looking back I feel it took me another three weeks to fully get over it completely. Over that period, I often thought of keeping two logs. One of how many Ks my legs were doing and one to track my runny nose. So in the end, I found myself at the starting line having done only four 31.5K run in the 14 weeks since Gold Coast. As well I had been having some niggles in my left calf over the last month that were playing on my mind.



So the plan was to start out at 5min Ks and just see how I went. I was expecting that in the last 10k the inevitable fade would occur as I tired but I was happy to go with that as long as I got to the finish line.


The Friday night before going down, I went to the Roar game and witnessed a rare home win. Yeah!! I normally come home and watch a recording of the game and seeing we had one I couldn't resist, so it turned out to be a late night.



The flight out the next morning was a scheduled for 8:15 am, so it was up early as well. It certainly was a strange feeling, My Wife and I shutting the door behind us and leaving our sixteen year old eldest in charge of the other three children for the weekend. We have never done this before but now was the time.



We were staying in East Melbourne about 1 K from the start, so on arrival made our way to the start area to suss things out. Bumped into Tesso , Mat , The Toasties, et al and had a rather large pasta lunch at the MCG which certainly filled me up so that I only needed a light dinner. My Wife and I walked into town and visited a Gallery in Federation Square and went into the Pixar exhibition where to our surprise was a model of Mike from Monster's Inc.


Our three daughter's are all big into dancing and the highlight of the year for them is the end of year concert. This year Dory has been chosen to be Mike in one of her dances. Mmm. I may be one-eyed but I can see why they picked her. (Luckily she doesn't read this blog).


After that it was a light dinner and I was asleep by 9:00pm.


On Sunday morning, I arrived at the start with 15 minutes to start time. It was hard to know where to slot into the accumulated mass of 8,000 starters for the Half and Full. I made my choice and ended next to Karen. We then waited. The start was delayed by 20 minutes and the longer I waited and looked around at my fellow competitors, the more I realised I should have been a little closer to the front. The gun eventually went and it took well over three minutes to get to the start line but we were really only walking even then. The first 500 metres is all down hill but even that didn't get things moving. The first K was 5:27. At the left turn into St Kilda Rd things again slowed to a walk but the congestion eased a little after this. The 2nd K was much quicker at 5:17!


All up St Kilda Road, it was a matter of ducking and weaving around people and even though by the third K, I had managed to get to 5 minute Ks, it was hard work mentally. The first drink station was an absolute bun fight which I chose not to participate in. If you can imagine 15 people abreast in columns all moving over to the take drinks at the first table you can get an idea of what was happening. The poor volunteers were completely swamped and could not get the sachets out of the boxes fast enough to satisfy the throngs. It was not much better at the next drink station either.


It was with great relief that at the 13k mark the Half Marathoners peeled off to the left to head back and things started to settle down. It always nice to get into a rhythm or a zone early in a marathon but that had not been possible up to that point. I think it showed in my Heart Rate. On such a flat course, I would have expected to be able to churn out just sub 5m/ks at around 140- 145 but I managed to oscillate between 140 and 159 over the first 13k.


Maybe some of that variation could have been explained by the wonderfully upbeat soukous from the Congolese album Sangonini by Les Quatres Etioles (The Four Stars) that I listened to for the first seventy minutes.




The course was now following by the bay and I don't know if it was just the sight of all that water but I really felt like I needed a toilet stop, so ducked behind a shrub to gain some relief which made for a 5:22 K 15th K.

I really got into a nice groove along here. The half way point came and 1:45:47 saw me just over the 5m/K average. At this point , the runners coming back from the turn around were coming by. It is always a good point in a race and helps occupy the mind. Lots of "Go Coolrunner" from me as people passed. I saw Eagle, I Like Toast, Mat and Tesso and many other Coolrunners who I didn't know. Then at the turn around I was seeing all the people still on their out bound journey.




I was now listening to my compilations of my favourite music from 2006. Every track a favourite, what away to go. It always impresses on me what a great racing song Bruce Springsteen's "Keep you Eyes on the Prize" is. I passed my sister somewhere along this stretch.




I spotted Tesso ahead of me in the distance and was slowly catching up to her and eventually passed her and another CR at around 31K (I think). I was still managing to churn out the 5 minute ks and feeling very comfortable. The weather was quite strange. Parts of the course here had a bit of a head wind and it was quite cooling but if the breeze stopped it was quite warm with the cloudless sky.


At 32k , I was still feeling good . Down St Kilda Rd, I latched on to another runner who was doing the same pace as me and we stayed together right up to the bridge before the MCG.




With about 2k to go, I estimated that if I kept up the current pace I could possibly go sub 3:30 but having walked over that bridge the day before I knew it would take a super effort to keep the pace up going up that rise. I would leave the heroics to another day, so I cruised up the bridge , soaked up the tunnel of spectators around the members entrance of MCG, and then slowly built up the speed again on the long loop around the MCG concourse until I finally entered the entrance under the stand and burst forth into the greatest sporting arena in Australia the MCG.


As I completed that last last lap on the grass, I imagined the stands were full and I was finishing to their standing ovation. What a brilliant experience and one I will always treasure. Managed to get the Heart Rate up to 177 over that last couple of hundred metres so it seems I still had a bit in the tank. In the end I managed to negative split the second half by some 42 seconds. WHAT A FANTASTIC DAY.



After getting out of the recovery area, went inside and caught up with My Wife. I wanted to wait around and see my sister finish but it was so cold inside the MCG and I was starting to shake so we went outside and waited in the sun to see her go by. After that we went back to the apartment and had a shower and then caught up with everyone at the Transport Hotel. An equally great end to a fine day.


I would recommend to everyone to do this race. I hope the organisers iron out a few of the bugs regarding the start and the water stations. It would be an ideal course to go for a good time but for just the experience it will be hard to beat. If the current course configuration stays this event will be huge.


My other lasting impression I will take from the race will be the incredible 13 Spartans that were doing their 3oth straight Melbourne marathon. I passed about four of these on the course. You could tell them by their T shirts which had "I have done the Lot" on the back. It certainly was inspring to be running amongst such elite company.

Thursday, October 04, 2007

Off to The G

It has been too long since the last post. Once our monthly data usage is up, our connection is speed limited and it is so slow I am not patient enough to wait. So every month, the point at which we get limited gets earlier and earlier. ( Could be three teenage girls and MySpace has something to do with it!)

So come a new month and then the computer crashes. Doh.

But we are back in business just in time before I head off to Melbourne for the Marathon this Sunday.

To catch up with how training has gone here are the boring stats.

Week 17 sept - 23rd Sept

Mon Rest
Tue 9.5k 45:06 @ 4:44 HR 151 81% MaxHR (Hilly)
Wed 14.5k 1:12:42 @ 5:00 HR 139 75%MaxHR
Thu 9.5k 44:08 @ 4:38 HR 148 80% MaxHR
Fri 14.5k 1:12:07 @ 4:58 (No HR record)
Sat Rest
Sun Rest - actually had a twinge in lower right calf which I decided to rest

Week 24th Sept - 30th Sept

Mon 9.5k 43:56 @ 4:37 HR 145 78%MaxHR
Tue 9.5k 44:00 @ 4:37 HR 153 82% MaxHR (Hilly)
Wed 14.5k 1:15:23 @ 5:11 HR 138 74%MaxHR
Thu 9.5k 44:20 @ 4:40 HR151 81% MaxHR
Fri 9.5k 49:39 @ 5:13 HR 134 72% MaxHR
Sat Rest
Sun 9.5k 43:46 @ 4:36 HR 153 82%MaxHR (Hilly)

Week 1st Oct - 4th Oct(Thursday)

Mon Rest
Tue 9.5k 42:57 @ 4:31 HR 152 82%MaxHR
Wed Rest
Thu 6.8k 34:04 @ 5:00 (No HR recording)

I guess it has turned into a three week taper. I certainly wasn't planning it to be like that. The runs have been all over the shop. Some I have been happy with and other disappointed. What has been noticeable over the last couple of weeks is how the temperature and humidity have risen significantly and now 25C and 70% humidity is not unusual.

I might go out for a short run again tomorrow night before going to the Roar game. Then I fly out early Saturday morning with My Wife for our first ever time away from the children. Why has it taken nearly 17 years?

As for the marathon, my only aim is to have a good time and make it for the final lap of the MCG. My run tonight was 5:00m/K and to me that seems a very comfortable pace to set out at. I would be very surprised though if I'll be able to maintain that all the way though. Not enough long runs since Gold Coast for that.