Getting back into it!

So, it has been forever since I posted anything on here. My running has been very similar over 2014. I was travelling almost an hour to and from work, became a dad and didn’t make time to run. This was incredibly detrimental to my mental state!!!

Having a daughter has been awesome and has really put things into perspective. My Father’s Day was celebrated by a run with my girl in her stroller as she had just turned six months old and could therefore hold her head up enough to enjoy the ride without being injured. Running with a stroller has changed the way I run, now a road run seems less mundane! You still can’t beat the trails though!

So 2015 sees some changes. I have changed jobs (again) I’m 30 and have no idea what I want to be when I grow up! I am trying to be more proactive, run a lot more and have the ultimate goal of becoming a marathoner.

Wether it’s read or not I plan to get back to posting on here as I take the next steps to reaching 42.2!

Parkrun has just started in Hamilton!

Parkrun has just started in Hamilton!

I hadn’t heard about Parkrun until an email from my wife late last week that had been sent to her from a keen runner in her office who thought I might be interested. I absolutely love the concept, maybe it’s because I’m cheap and there’s no cost, or maybe it’s that I like the idea of runners looking out for other runners, or maybe it’s the fact that it’s a flat 5k followed by a coffee and a yarn. Either way if your in or near Hamilton at 8am on a Saturday come along. There’s only be one so far, but I think it’s the beginning of a beautiful thing! 

8 Stages of Marathon Running

I have never actually run a full marathon and fully admired those that have!
Thought this was awesome and can totally relate with some of the events that I have done!!!!

Isolation in a trail run can be a good and bad thing. Sometimes I think the isolation can add to the elation.

Stressed Out? Run!

What is the very best thing for me to do when I’m stressed out?

Exercise!! 

What is the last thing that I feel like doing when I’m stressed out?

Exercise!!

I know when I have heaps going on that the best thing I can do for myself and for anyone around me is to exercise. Even a short blast around the block or chasing my dog around the backyard seems to help me to “find my happy place!” 

This being said nothing beats the direct act of seeking out some sweet single track through the bush and running until my legs can hardly move. Sometimes this isn’t very far at all!

Clearly I am not alone on this:

http://www.runnersworld.com/trail-running-training/less-stress-more-bliss

A great trail run on a Sunday can almost see me through to the following Sunday as long as that annoying thing in between (the working week) doesn’t deliver to many curve balls.

TGIF (Thank God It’s Friday) should read TGIS (Thank God It’s Sunday) because that’s the day I hit the trails for a long run and all is good in the world.

Today is Wednesday, hump day.

See you soon Sunday, but not soon enough!!

Hakarimata walkway – the ultimate stair master!

The Hakarimata walkway behind Ngaruawahia has become my go to spot to put some serious hurt into my calves. The other week a mate and I decided to push it up there to give ourselves a decent benchmark of our current fitness. The grand plan is to hit it up on a weekly basis come the longer evenings of daylight savings (that’s right I’m over winter already!) as a good way to get the legs going before this years Goat in early December.

This track is extremely accessible from Ngaruawahia and travels from Brownlee ave to a lookout tower at the highest point in the Hakarimata scenic reserve. It is only a short drive from Hamilton which makes it a fantastic after work burst to get the heart pumping out of the chest!

We headed out relatively early on a Sunday morning and there were already four our five cars waiting silently in the carpark for their sweaty and exhausted owners to return.

We’d both decided to track our efforts using map my run on our phones, if anyone out there is feeling extremely generous I would love a sunnto ambit! We started them at the same point and I beat him to the summit, but somehow it tracked my time as  slower than his. Good thing I don’t measure my success on who the current king of the mountain is on map my run!

This is a short but tough climb and has me hurting early and breathing hard all the way to the summit. The elevation profile shows you why:

At times it can feel like a punishment rather than a training run so when I met a guy on my way up who was singing at the top of his lungs as he rocked his way back down from the summit all I could do was smile. He was loving life and really enjoying his workout. This made me think about my own efforts. Is it time to throw out the tracking software and forget about how far I run and how long it takes me. Maybe it’s time to focus on just getting out there and doing it, having fun and feeling good. Kinda hard to do as I gasp for breath, but once back at the car I felt pretty dam good and it was a great way to start a Sunday morning!

Time to grab a coffee on the way home and feel good for the rest of the day about 1. Getting up early and 2. Having reached a summit before breakfast (well a second breakfast!)

Is there one event that you return to every year? What draws you back?

So once again I have signed up for the Goat alpine adventure run. This was my first real off-road run and I’m super excited about returning to the original course after last years last minute change of course due to volcanic activity at the crater lake.

Not only is this the tenth year of the Goat but they have also added a new event to increase overall numbers to 1000 competitors.

I can’t wait to once again run from Whakapapa to Turoa around Mt Ruapehu in the middle of Tongariro National Park.

I know that I’m going to get some strange looks from my non runner friends as i explain to them once again why I am turning down that extra beer to get up at sparrows fart on the weekend to run up a mountain for “training.” But truth be told this is one event that most of them can actually relate to as it is a pretty simple, if not daunting thing to picture running around the base of the North Islands largest mountain (Ruapehu). In fact the goat goes bush is also very much like that as it travels over the Kaimais.

The Goat course Whakapapa to Turoa.

These point to point races are great to explain to my friends just what an undertaking my events are. It is often extremely difficult for them to fathom running more than 2-3 km on the road. Why would you what to run 21km around a mountain?

On the other hand I feel that I can begin to appreciate just how far a 42 or 60km race really is. This takes an extreme amount of commitment in training and lifestyle choices that marathoners and ultra runners take in their stride (pun not intended).

Give yourselves a great big pat on the back!!!

This does not mean that I’ll be entering Tarawera anytime soon!

I can appreciate others commitment, not commit!

The Goat Tongariro is a special event for me and an event that I don’t want to miss. These guys do a great job in a truly amazing and ever changing landscape.

If you really sell it I might see you on the startline!

Dirty wet head!

Even more fun than it sounds!

The second event of the Xterra Auckland trail run series was almost three weeks ago! Yeah I’m not great at updating the blog (or training) or generally getting motivated at the moment (dam wet cold winter nights!). This one was at Riverhead forest and was completely different to the first event in Shakespear.

The super long course was 24km, this was my longest event so far. I have run a few half marathons and didn’t really think the extra few k’s would be an issue (boy was I wrong!).

It was dirty and wet which I thoroughly enjoyed. What was not great was how weak I felt at the end. I was absolutely shattered! I put it down to being poorly organised and not really thinking about my nutrition the night/morning before the event. My time of 2:38:14 put me well in the second half of the pack. I was never hoping to win or nothing and I’m not overly disappointed with my time but I was feeling pretty annoyed with myself for not being able to truly enjoy the adventure as I  hadn’t prepared properly!

In saying that at least I wasn’t as bad as my mate who ran the mid course in his casual knee length cotton shorts because he left his running shorts in Hamilton!!!

He reckons that it wasn’t to bad. I think he’s lucky it was only 12k, because i think there would be some serious chafing going on after too many more!!!!

Lets hope that we have both learnt our lesson and the next event in Waiuku this weekend goes a bit better for both of us.

Lion in the Sand!

The obligatory jumping photo!

Sunday was the first race in the Xterra Auckland Trail Run Series at Shakespear Regional Park. I have entered the whole winter series and this was a great way to kick it off. As i haven’t done any of these events before I had no idea what to expect.

I like to run, I like to think that I’m all-right at it. Trail or road, all of my running is done on land (funny that). I am not a swimmer. So when we were told in the race briefing that there would be some wading through waist deep water I was a little concerned. That waist deep water turned out to be closer to my shoulders! I managed to bust out a couple of freestyle strokes and clamber up the rocks back to terra firma. I’ve never done the ice bath thing, but this compulsory plunge into a less than tropical Hauraki Gulf was definitely a shock to the tiring muscles!

All in all it was a good experience and as the website states “It’s essentially two very different courses back to back resulting in a superb and quite unique superlong course in the XTERRA series.” The first half around the shoreline taking in both jagged rocks and a sandy beach and the second half over some rolling (hilly) farmland.

And finally to explain the title of this blog I saw a Sea Lion!!!!!!

Yep, one of these guys was hanging out on the rocks. I heard a horrendous roar/burp and thought someone had grossly over estimated their fitness level and had lost their breakfast behind the rocks. However it was one of these little guys hanging out a few metres from where we ran by, pretty sure my split for that section would have increased!

Next event in the series is set to be very different. Bring on Riverhead Forest on the 9th of June!!

Cross Country Training

Not my class (for obvious reasons)

I was never one of those kids that hated running, in fact I have always been blessed with a natural ability for it. My first school cross country I ran the whole way and came 2nd.  I don’t have any haunting memories of running around the school field in bare feet with teachers telling encouraging me to run all the way.

But that’s now what I am doing. I’m the teacher and I am encouraging my students to run all the way without stopping. I was interested to read some recommendations today about training plans for my students from Sport Waikato:

Recommended Distances 

Distances should be long enough so that children are not tempted to sprint all the way and short enough so that children don’t become stressed.

The effort should be aerobic which means that the children should be able to talk to each other while running.

Training

5 – 6 years	800m – 1200m	or        4 – 6 minutes
7 – 8 years	1200m – 1500m	or        5 – 8 minutes
9-10 years	1500m – 2000m	or        6 – 10 minutes
11 – 13 years	2000m – 3000m	or        8 – 15 minutes

Motivational moment: I have a 6 year old girl who can run for 10 mins without stopping!

I’m taking my running shoes to school tomorrow to see if I can keep up with her. I’m hoping that this will also help to motivate the other students.

I would hate to be that teacher that instills a passionate hatred of running as a result of training for our primary school cross country. I know a lot of people who hated running at school and swore off of it for 10 or 20 years dreading every P.E. lesson and cringing at the idea of the words Fun and Run ever being uttered in the same breath.

My students, friends and family often think I’m crazy for running the events/distances that I do. They don’t understand how I can enjoy it. However they can all see that I do enjoy it.

I enjoy running. I wish everyone could share my passion. For those that don’t I certainly hope its not because you were made to train everyday for a primary school cross country race that meant something to your teacher and nothing to you!

Procrastination 101

So I have a super busy week this week with heaps of planning to do and a course on Thursday and another on Friday followed by the first of the Xterra Auckland trail runs on Sunday. Add to that having a cold (another bonus of being a teacher, snotty kids!) this should be an interesting week!

A good week to get on with it and knuckle down.

Sooo what do I decide to do………….

buy the latest Wilderness Magazine so that I can read this:

That’s right all this work pilling up and I go out of my way to find the perfect way to procrastinate and I’m not feeling the least bit guilty (that may change during the week!).

If I can’t actually escape to a trail until the weekend at least I can read about them!