Up to the mountains to Glenbrook to meet up with fellow car shufflers Jen and Wazza. The length of the drive is a little scary given we would be running back! Parked the car in a location I was a little worried about and so then found a better park near the station so went back and moved it closer. Then we went up to the start area and hitched a lift on a RFS troop carrier to get our number and tag. Amazingly no safety pins left and the people doing the rego were pretty blase about it, "well too many people took 4 pins and now there are none left"! It was not as if I was registering late and if you give people a number bib with 4 holes how many pins will they take!
Anyway back to the start again with the firies and then loitering around chatting with all and sundry waiting for the bikes to all clear out. Finally they called us up to the line and after a bit of waiting we were off!
The first 4km was mostly downhill and also being a bit technical trail running I was doing quite nicely (4km in 16:33). I was swapping places with Kanagra through here, going past him on the downhill and he likewise on the ups!
The next 8km or so were tougher with a lot more ups and downs into the mix and a few Striders drifted past, including Suzanne K, but I was holding my own in general, about 20-30m behind Blue Dog.
As we approached the downhill I caught up to the Dog at a drinks station and we had a quick chat, I then eased away from him as the downhill picked up. About 500m later he drew back up to me and then easily accelerated away! I was struggling a little with leg speed but tried to focus on form and the people in front of me. Just near the turn off to the smaller track Charles Coville and Barry Rutter caught me. This is now standard practice with Barry hauling me in in pretty much every major race in the last year or so, sigh....
Somehow I kept them in sight and was starting to make some progress on Stephen Kibble, another Strider who went past me on the last uphill and who I had been about 50m behind for about 10km. At about the 2km mark I got to within 5m of him but then slipped away again. Just near the 1km mark I saw colin who had come up to watch the finish, at about the same time Spud drew up to me and despite my efforts slowly drew away, damn good running after running 96km last Saturday and finishing 2nd in PMC!!!
Finally the line arrived and just in time!
Stats
Distance 25km
Time 1:52:40
Avg Pace 4:30
Avg HR 171
Very pleased with this as it is 5 minutes better than last year, so a good indicator as to my improved fitness, despite inconsistent training! I'm sure with a slightly better base, but more importantly better leg speed I could knock a few more off next year.
Loitered around to watch the presentations, quite a few Striders won places and then to cap things off Barry won the major lucky draw prize a Trek Mountain Bike! Then we went in search of the supposed shuttles back to the railway station with no success. Luckily Jen's family helped out to get us back up to the car park. Thanks to Jen for then carting 4 semlly guys back up to Woodford to pick up our respective cars!!
Back to hills and speedwork in search of this elusive leg speeed!
6 comments:
Great run Dave, a 5 minute PB is welcome anytime. Good to see Striders do so well out there too.
A 5 minute PB is some sort of an achievement Dave. I look forward to following your progress over the next couple of months. I am sure there will be more PBs around the corner.
Congrats on the PB Dave. And thanks for your support not only yesterday but always. I was sooo nice to be running with you guys (albeit, a long way behind) yesterday.
Fantastic run Dave. A 5 minute PB - woohoo!!! It sounds like a tough run.
You certainly must be gaining in confidence now. You have Sydney Marathon on the agenda don't you?
I'm always inspired everytime I read your blog. thats some great running. And for my money the pin incident comes a very close second.
Nice result on W2G Dave - great stuff.
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