3 Sundays, 3 countries and January!

Sunday 1 - So after the success and semi-gloating of my ride (previous post) I came crashing down the following day. I organised to meet up with a mate to have some company, but he is a much better runner. Anyway we agreed that I would show him my 25km loop. A little faster out and by about 10km I was feeling the pinch a bit and spent a little extra time at each water stop to try and refresh. By the time we got to about 7km to go I was toast, in fact started to get dizzy. After a break and some sugar from Andy in the form of jelly beans I came good for a while but with about 2km to go I told him to go ahead as I was completely shot and then walked it home. In retrospect I can see all the reasons why, the legs were tired after the cycle, I was probably dehydrated from Saturday, despite the large water intake, I was up late assembling more Ikea furniture and then as a result bolted out the door without any food to then run a bit faster than I have been. It took me about 2 hours of drinking and eating to start to feel human again. A very good leason to learn!

The following Tuesday I headed out for a redemption style tempo run with the goal of bettering the previous session, mission accomplished with a new avg pace of 4:56 for the 13km, a struggle in the last 1.5km though with not much left in the tank! Then it was off to Country 1, Thailand with our CEO for some meetings which diced any option to run (although it is really an excuse as I could have if I planned a bit better!)

Sunday 2 - the Australia Day celebrations at the kids school on Saturday eliminated riding with the bunch and so on Sunday I headed out much better prepared, with a couple of slices of toast in the stomach and a small packet of lollies to keep the sugar levels up. I also decided to approach the route in reverse, close to halfway I was feeling pretty good and so added a bit of exploring to try and slightly increase the distance, following someof the MR25 runners on a short out and back loop. I think the reverse option was a good idea with running later in the morning then still under some shade as I looped through the jungle trails. I was feeling so good that I really pushed on the way home and was very satisfied with the "new" distance of 27.3km covered at an average pace of 5:53, certainly way better than last week!

That night I was on the red eye to Country 2 - Korea and with temperatures ranging from -5 to 2 degrees outside and again some ordinary scheduling, no running! Wednesday night onto Country 3 - The Philippines and here I managed to sneak in a tempo run on the treadmill, 10km at 5 min/k pace.

So that ended January with 211km running, 146km cycling and 1km swimming (yes on Sundays after my long run I take Stella to swim squad and we have struck a "deal" where I now also swim in a spare lane!) The running distance, while not immense is of course actually more than I ran in the previous 4 months combined, with a blatent disregard for the 10% rule.

Sunday 3 - no riding again yesterday as we headed off for the girls first game of netball up here and then trudged around Orchard Rd to find a new suit. It was more of a challenge just to find a salesperson who wanted to serve us but eventually we found both service and a great suit, much to everyone's relief! Again this morning I followed the same prep and headed out, a little faster than last week initially and also with a planned option to increase last week's route a little further. Feeling good at the decision point and I did the extension and pushed all the way home. Very pleased to finally get back to a STaR type distance with a new route distance of 29.4km and done in an average pace of 5:47 (not a lot of climb to be called hilly though!). The conditions have to make this a solid run, one of my challenges now is chafing, I am sweating the sportshield away completely and then walking like a cowboy for the rest of the day! Also as another sign of the climate, I again lost 3.5kg in running just under 3 hours!! I then also pushed a little harder at the pool and timed an interval style approach to 500m, with 100m warm up and down to take me to 700m (no times yet though!)

So this coming week needs to be a good week, we get Thursday and Friday off due to Chinese New Year and Netball is also off on Saturday so I get another road ride in as well! I am truly hoping that while I am not knocking heavy distances each week that the training in the conditions will have some impact when I actually run somewhere a little cooler and less humid (although not sub zero like Seoul!)