nearly normal

For me it is back to most of my “normal” running routine. For February and March I think my effort days will be Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday/Sunday alternating. The first Saturday/Sunday will be Stromlo (when it re-opens)/Long. The second Saturday/Sunday will be rest/race.
I also resume gym, twice a week. Which may be just what I need to fire up some speed again.

Plans this week
Monday 1 February Parliament House 4:30pm easy run, 5:30pm interval training. Not as hard as usual since most people raced yesterday. And/or may want to race tomorrow!
Tuesday 2 February Summer Series race #1, 6:15pm. This will be at the boathouse, Menindee Drive Barton, running EAST. The change of direction is because long time club member Milton Valentine is in the hospice and the run will take us past his window where he may be able to watch us go by. Milton is of course very unwell.
Wednesday 3 February 12:15pm BBQ Stakes. My plans are to go and jog it this week. In future weeks I may have little opportunity to do so as I get further into my normal routine.
Thursday 4 February Vets track, not sure what to run, maybe just the 3k?
6:00pm 3000m
6:20pm 400m
7:00pm 200m "Daniels" handicap
7:15pm 4x1500m relay
7:40pm long hurdles
8:00pm 4x100m relay
8:15pm spiral 5 lap
Sunday 7 February 6:30am long run; meet at the zoo. All being well, I think I will try for 26k, running out and back along the south side of the lake.

Andrew Matthews

Gold medallist at Campbell Park 6.0k. Picture from his Facebook page.

Running in the 3.0k yesterday, I passed 14 people, no people passed me. But... this is because better runners like John, Katie, and Ken started before me. Gary who started behind me only gained half the distance between us. I still haven’t quite achieved my ambition to be the backmarker, and this run won’t do it for next time when I would expect to be be starting ahead of a few more runners.

Can't wait to get to training today with the speedygeese, everyone is running so well!

speedygeese twentyten blitz continues!

Saturday's approximate 800m times
Geoff S 2:26.41
Ken 2:26.57
Garry 2:36.14
Katie 2:38.86
Rachelle 2:41.19
Amanda 2:42.56
Emma 2:42.66
Heidi 2:49.09 **PB **
Tony 2:51.21
Heidi continues to impress - it was her first run on the track (at least for many decades)

Sunday's Vets handicap
Campbell Park 6.0k
5 Andrew Matthews M50 26:24 73.0% **GOLD**
6 Emma Adams W40 29:19 67.8
7 Warrick Howieson M35 28:51 60.9
8 Jennifer Bright W30 28:29 66.2
10 Mick Charlton M55 46:34 44.5
13 Craig Davis M40 28:19 63.3 **SILVER**
14 Brett Morrison M40 27:17 65.7 **BRONZE**
15 Michelle Wells W35 27:21 71.3
18 Nadine Morrison W40 27:04 73.4
27 Ewen Thompson M50 31:25 62.5
29 David Baussmann M55 29:19 71.3
30 Maria O'Reilly W55 29:21 79.0
33 Janene Kingston W45 28:59 70.5
34 Christopher Lang M55 31:39 65.5
45 Bronwyn Calver W40 28:37 69.4
52 Heidi Johnston W35 27:44 71.0
56 Rae Palmer W60 32:42 77.5
57 Margaret McSpadden W60 38:03 66.6
68 Debbie Cowell W50 28:39 77.6
83 Troy Steinman M35 23:55 72.3
104 Jodie Davis W40 39:32 51.1
113 Ruth Baussmann W55 33:37 72.6
123 Mick Horan M50 31:17 61.6
125 Roger Pilkington M50 32:01 60.7
133 finishers

31/01/10 - Campbell Park 3.0k
7 Cathy Newman W45 16:53 63.3%
8 Garry Maher M60 14:15 73.9 **BRONZE **
17 Cathy Montalto W55 15:14 79.2
18 Leanne Steinman W35 16:21 59.3
19 Neil Boden M55 14:44 69.4
21 Katie Forestier W40 12:02 83.9
25 Graeme Patrick M55 13:34 73.6
27 Ken White M55 12:16 80.4
39 Noeline Burden W55 16:17 72.7
42 Geoff Moore M60 12:52 80.9
46 Gary Bowen M50 12:45 75.7
57 finishers
The speedytrifecta of Andrew, Craig & Brett blitzed the field and stole the show. All three have been training very hard recently and have been showing good improvement. Well deserved!
For me, I have to be happy exceeding 80%, even though it was by far my slowest time on this course in four attempts..... It's 12 months since I last ran well.

Ruth

Listen up, there's good news on the horizon. Stay tuned!

personal bests galore

Here are the speedygeese results from Thursday night
100m
M60 Garry Maher 14.20 83.9%
W40 Emma Adams 15.25 72.1
W55 Noeline Burden 16.52 78.9

200m
M60 Garry Maher 29.16 83.9%
W35 Rachelle Ellis-Brownlee 30.2 72.0
W40 Emma Adams 30.3 74.7
W55 Noeline Burden 33.4 81.3

1500m
M50 Rod Lynch 5:07.00 78.5%
W40 Katie Forestier 5:19.60 80.4 **PB by 1 second **
M50 Roger Pilkington 5:30.66 73.5
M40 Brett Morrison 5:42.25 64.7 **PB by 12 seconds**
W40 Nadine Morrison 5:42.80 71.7 **PB by 1 second **
W45 Janene Kingston 5:45.79 75.2 **PB by 10 seconds **
W40 Amanda Walker 5:48.81 72.0
W40 Bronwyn Calver 6:02.53 67.8
W55 Ruth Baussmann 7:21.21 70.8
W60 Margaret McSpadden 7:52.50 69.1

Pennington 3000m official results (finishing order)
5 Rod Lynch M50 11:19 74.1%
6 Tony Booth M70 13:20 76.1
7 Katie Forestier W40 11:48 77.1
9 Kathy Sims W55 13:17 82.2
12 Ken White M55 12:10 72.4
13 Roger Pilkington M50 11:57 70.7
14 Helen Larmour W50 13:21 73.4
16 Troy Steinman M35 10:55 69.5
17 Nadine Morrison W40 12:31 69.9
24 Amanda Walker W40 13:25 66.4
26 Ruth Baussmann W55 15:16 72.5
27 Brett Morrison M40 13:01 60.1
32 Margaret McSpadden W60 17:31 66.1
36 finishers

Rachelle

At the track last year. 
On Thursday Rachelle pipped Emma in the 200m in a great race. I have usually only published our middle and long distance performances, but I have started to publish our sprint performances as well, because more members of our group are running them.

a goose wins the turkey

Margaret

There was a 2000m walk guess your time ("turkey handicap") at Vets track last night, which was won by Margaret McSpadden, despite the presence of cunning walkers such as Rod Gilchrist and Robyn White. Well done Margaret!

Here are my estimates of the 3000m times. It was a handicap event, so these times and the official times will only be approximate. In starting order:
Margaret 17.29
Tony 13.19
Ruth 15.14
Kathy 13.15
Helen 13.19
Victoria 13.41
Katie 11.44
Nadine 12.29
Amanda 13.22
Ken 12.09
Roger 11.56
Rod 11.19
Rachelle 12.02 ONE LAP SHORT
Brett 13.00
Troy 10.53
Poor Rachelle, she learnt that if you lose count of your laps, nobody is going to help you out until after you finish. Then suddenly everyone seems to know!

Broulee
Thanks to Nev Madden, I now have a link to the Broulee Runners blog on my website. I think running along the beach at Broulee might be easier than struggling along in Canberra's heat. Hello to all the runners at Broulee. The link is http://brouleerunners.blogspot.com/. 149 individual participants in 3 years. wow!

Motivation

This motivational poster remains one of my favourites

Barefoot best for running - study

From http://www.news.com.au
The best running shoe may be none at all, US researchers said.
Runners who don't wear shoes may be less likely to do serious injury to their feet, because they hold their feet differently, researchers at Harvard University found.
Writing in the journal Nature, they said runners who wore shoes tended to hit the ground with their heels first, whereas barefoot runners put the balls of their feet down first.
"People who don't wear shoes when they run have an astonishingly different strike," Professor Daniel Lieberman said.
"By landing on the middle or front of the foot, barefoot runners have almost no impact collision, much less than most shod runners generate when they heel-strike.
"Most people today think barefoot running is dangerous and hurts, but actually you can run barefoot on the world's hardest surfaces without the slightest discomfort and pain.
"All you need is a few callouses to avoid roughing up the skin of the foot."
Prof Lieberman and his colleagues at Harvard, the University of Glasgow, and Kenya's Moi University studied runners who had always run barefoot, those who had always worn shoes and runners who had abandoned shoes.
Barefoot runners had a springier step overall, and used their calf and foot muscles more efficiently, they found.
Demonstrations can be seen at http://www.barefootrunning.fas.harvard.edu.
People used to running in shoes should not start barefoot trotting right away, Prof Lieberman cautioned.
"If you've been a heel-striker all your life, you have to transition slowly to build strength in your calf and foot muscles," he said.
But he noted that evolution was on his side.
"Humans have engaged in endurance running for millions of years, but the modern running shoe was not invented until the 1970s," he said.

kangaroo

As I left a meeting in Duffy Street, Ainslie, at 10pm Monday just before Australia Day, I noticed there were two kangaroos standing silently on the front lawn of the house next door.

You see them quite often up in Ainslie, especially when there hasn't been much rain; they come down from Mt Ainslie & Mt Majura looking for food and water. One of my friends even saw a kangaroo drinking from a bird bath this week.

So for international readers, it is true that in Australia, kangaroos can be seen hopping down the main street. Not all that often; they are more often seen out in the fields in the early morning or late at night, dozens at a time, and during the day would normally be sleeping up in forested areas.

Culling of kangaroos is carried out occasionally and is really no big deal, as kangaroos such as the Eastern Grey species pictured above abound in large numbers. But culling is only a temporary measure; they breed so prolifically their numbers bounce back very quickly. So there's not much point.

Kangaroo meat has a wide range of health benefits compared with beef, for example, being low in fat, and includes anti-carcinogenic and anti-diabetes properties, in addition to reducing obesity and atherosclerosis. Kangaroos are better for the environment too, as kangaroos produce almost no methane. Why we cannot phase out our sheep and cattle farming and phase in kangaroo farming, I do not know. It would be a great environmental and climate change measure and an example to the rest of the world.

Evermore
Rather than attending a meeting on Monday night, kangaroos and all, I would have sooner been watching Evermore at the Australia Day concert in Canberra. That's the second time I have missed them. Nevermind there will always be a next time.

Thursday track: THIS IS A COME & TRY IT NIGHT. HOP DOWN TO BRUCE, BRING A FRIEND, NEIGHBOUR, RELATIVE AND INTRODUCE THEM TO THE BENEFITS AND JOYS OF VETERAN ATHLETICS!! THEY WILL NOT HAVE TO PAY THE ENTRY FEE. And just a reminder that "Athletes Check In" is in the Commonwealth Room.

January handicap
The next Vets Run/Walk Handicap will be held on Sunday 31st January at Campbell Park. Please note that there is an early start for this Handicap – it will commence at 8.30am. Long Course 6K. Short Course 3K

To get there, turn off Fairbairn Ave at Northcott Drive and follow the road to the right around the outside of the car park to the far northeast corner (Map 60 G3).

We will see many kangaroos on Sunday morning at Campbell Park. Mainly on our warm-up run before the herds of racing runners frighten them away. I wish I had the same fast twitch muscle fibres that kangaroos have!

the awful eighties and nineties

Monday Training at Weston Park
Attendees: Andrew, Bronia, Bronwyn, Emma, Ewen, Garry, me, Jennifer, Jodie, Kat, Katherine, Leanne, Matthew, Neil, Noeline, Ruth, Tim & Warrick. We enjoyed the temporary change of venue and ran in the shade up a manageable hill, from a rare spot where water was available. It was hot, but the humidity was also high, but with a breeze off the lake the conditions were quite bearable and everyone managed their twenty sprints very well.

Tuesday training run over the Weston Creek Half Marathon course.
Attendees: Brett, Charlie, Craig, Ewen, Gary, me, Heidi, Helen, Maria & Nadine. Most ran about 19k; while Brett, Craig and I ran the full 21k+, and Helen about 15k. We also spied on the run Katherine, Pam F, Bernie, Graeme, Cate, Gary and others out there doing their thing. A popular morning for cyclists, too, some of whom may look good but lack courtesy, to put it mildly. And not-too-bad coffee in civic afterwards.

My music
I am listening to some real "oldies" as well as my usual "newies" these days. Here's my top playlist this month! Nothing at all from the eighties and nineties thank you very much; only sixties, seventies, and noughties.

1. I Know You - Incredible String Band - U
2. Fear - Creed - Full Circle
3. Darling Belle - Incredible String Band - Liquid Acrobats As Regards The Air
4. Thursday + Eastern Jam - Country Joe and the Fish - I Feel Like I'm Fixin' To Die
5. Fair As You - Incredible String Band - I Looked Up
6. Thought Dream - Country Joe and the Fish - I Feel Like I'm Fixin' To Die
7. Puppies - Incredible String Band - Wee Tam
8. Blood - The Middle East
9. Cosmic Boy - Incredible String Band - Liquid Acrobats As Regards The Air
10. On My Sleeve - Creed - Full Circle

11. Magnificent - U2 - No Line On The Horizon
12. Rainbow - Incredible String Band - U
13. Till There Was You - The Beatles - With The Beatles
14. Steal Your Soul - En Tout Cas
15. Worlds they Rise And Fall - Incredible String Band - Liquid Acrobats As Regards The Air
16. Hello Hurricane - Switchfoot - Hello Hurricane
17. Waltz Of The New Moon - Incredible String Band - The Hangman's Beautiful Daughter
18. Janis - Country Joe and the Fish - I Feel Like I'm Fixin' To Die
19. Baba O'Riley - The Who - Who's Next
20. Here Till Here Is There - Incredible String Band - Liquid Acrobats As Regards The Air

21. Hamburg Song - Keane - Under the Iron Sea
22. Needle and Haystack Life - Switchfoot - Hello Hurricane
23. Sunday Song - Incredible String Band - Earthspan
24. Close To Home - En Tout Cas
25. Forgiven - Skillet - Awake
26. Cutting The Strings - Incredible String Band - U
27. Moment Of Surrender - U2 - No Line On The Horizon
28. Maya - Incredible String Band - The Big Huge
29. Out Of Time - En Tout Cas
30. This Moment - Incredible String Band - I Looked Up

14, 36, 48, ...

And the winner is ... MARIA!

Maria turns 55 today, I wrote up Maria's pre-50 career highlights on 25/01/05.

Plans this week:
Monday 25/01 Weston Park 4:30pm 6k jog, 5:30pm interval training
Tuesday 26/01 Black Mountain Peninsula 6:30am: 21k training run
Thursday 28/01 Vets Track, "Come and Try It", bring your friends, including
.....6:00pm 1500m
.....7:00pm 200m
.....7:15pm 3000m handicap, the "Pennington".
.....7:40pm 100m
.....8:00pm medley relays
Saturday 30/01 2010 Australia Cup including 800m Vets handicap at 3:30pm
Sunday 31/01 Vets Handicap, Campbell Park, 8:30am

If you are on holidays today, have a good day, and make the most of your day off tomorrow.

Monday's training has been moved: this week only.

Remember, tomorrow (Monday) training has been moved from Parliament House - where a big concert is scheduled to start at 5:30pm - to Weston Park, at the locaton where the Women's Jogalong starts. This is up near the first toilet block. I'll be there at 4:30pm for a jog and the main group should arrive by 5:30pm. If parking is full there, continue on and park near the railway entrance. 

2010 Australia Cup - Saturday 30 January ACTVAC 800m Handicap
I know that Heidi (W35), who has never been seen on the track, has entered the 800m, and Emma (W40), hot from sprint training in Vancouver, is also running. This will be a treat! If you are considering running in it at all, you should decide to do so. 

To compete in the 800m you must contact Rachelle:
0410617532 / reb2900@hotmail.com  /vicepresident@actvac.com.
Thursday is the last final deadline to contact her. Events on Saturday commence 3pm, 800m at 3.30pm. Entry is free for competitors. As well as letting Rachelle know by Thursday, you must also sign in one hour before the events starts.

23 days gone
Despite the hot weather, those who have been training regularly are starting to look pretty good. I ran with Heidi and Craig this morning, 22.3k. It was my longest run for a while, and I faded from about 16k, but the other two finished strongly. I am looking forward to repeating the dose Tuesday morning. Victoria was out there too, starting even earlier. She is running very strongly. All this warm weather training means the short Summer Series races will not feel too bad.

Heidi racing at Weston Park

Many changes to our running plans over the next few days and weeks

Calling for runners to compete in an ACTVAC 800m race next weekend
2010 Australia Cup - Saturday 30 January ACTVAC 800m Handicap
Join in the aged graded 800 and then see the stars* in action - Lauren Boden, Tamsyn Lewis, Patrick Johnson, Nathan Deakes, Jarad Tallent plus many more.

Contact Rachelle Ellis-Brownlee now to register: 0410617532 / reb2900@hotmail.com / vicepresident@actvac.com
Events commence 3pm, 800m at 3.30pm. 
More information: http://www.athletics.com.au/competition/events/australia_cup_2010

Program for the next few days
(a) Sunday 24/01 6:30am meet at the zoo, run ~20-21k
(b) Monday 25/01 4:30pm jog/5:30pm training has been moved from Parliament House - where a big concert is scheduled to start at 5:30pm - to Weston Park, at the locaton where the Women's Jogalong starts.
(c) Tuesday 26/01 is Australia Day, and we are going to meet at Black Mountain Peninsula at 6:30am and run over the Weston Creek Half Marathon course
(d) Thursday 28/01 at Vets track is the Come and Try It night, then
(e) Saturday 30/01 is the Australia Cup with its 800m race, see above, and
(g) Sunday 31/01 is the Vets Handicap starting at 8:30am at Campbell Park.

Two weeks later at Dunrossil Drive is the Sprint-Marathon relay, I have entered this year, it is a fabulous event organised by Jim White, open to all. I suggest we all go and run it as our weekend hard run. Contact Jim to get your name included in the start list, he decides on team composition.

Meanwhile today was the last Saturday Pialligo training, instead of doing this in February and March I suggest we make our other hard run the Tuesday evening Summer Series races organised by the ACT Cross Country Club. Today Tony, Craig, Heidi, Troy & I did eight short intervals on the grass, our session with the warm-up and cool-down run totalled about 11.5k. Thanks Tony for hosting these sessions and allowing us to use your orchard and its welcome shade.

But first, contact Rachelle to be entered in the 800m this Saturday.

Katie, Rachelle, Helen

Thursday results
400m
M60 Garry Maher 64.19 83.9%
M50 Rod Lynch 67.41 73.5
W40 Emma Adams 70.82 74.1
W40 Katie Forestier 72.77 75.2
W40 Amanda Walker 75.39 71.1

1500m
M50 Rod Lynch 5:11.21 77.4%
M55 Ken White 5:13.83 80.9
W40 Katie Forestier 5:23.75 79.4
M60 Geoff Moore 5:40.47 77.7
M40 Brett Morrison 5:59.02 61.7
W40 Nadine Morrison 6:02.14 67.9

One Hour Run
M50 Ewen Thompson 12811
W40 Bronwyn Calver 12284
M50 Roger Pilkington 12162

spiral 4
3 Jodie Sims W30 7:27
5 Brett Morrison M40 6:40
6 Bronwyn Calver W40 6:46
8 Ruth Baussmann W55 8:03
13 Noeline Burden W55 8:10
14 Garry Maher M60 7:06
15 Gary Bowen M50 6:09
16 Jodie Davis W40 8:52
18 Nadine Morrison W40 6:49
20 Rod Lynch M50 6:18
25 Roger Pilkington M50 7:15

800m interclub Friday
Thea 2:46.53 pb by 2 seconds

track good, road bad?

On track Thursday I managed something like 5:41 for the 1500m - splits 87, 92, 92, 70. Obviously not a world shattering time. I was impressed by Vanessa's outright win later on in the one hour run. She completed the first 1500m of the hour in 5:37: quicker than my 1500m! It was still over 30 degrees when the hour run started, and it felt just as hot at the end. A big highlight of the night was the return of Emma from Vancouver, jet-lagged and only three days in Australia but back permanently. She raced the 400m and the 100m. How she's changed, she used to be a long distance mountain runner! Another good W40 for relays, she'll be talking the others into 4x100s before too long!

Emma

Returning to Australia: less of a culture shock, more of a weather shock.

Returning to Charlie's 45th birthday yesterday, other classy runners turning 45 this year include Katrina (I wonder how she's doing? Amanda might know), Kerrie B, and our Katie, who was the next runner in front of me in the 1500m last night.

Change of venue: This coming Monday 25 January there will be Australia Day chaos at Parliament House, so for one week only we will be meeting at Weston Park (near the toilet block, or if the car park there is full, near the railway entrance.) Spread the word!

Running on the road can have its drawbacks

But if you want to race on the road, the occasional long road training run is a must. That's why I run the lake from the zoo Sundays (6:30am), and plan to join Brett & Nadine Tuesday next week from Black Mountain Peninsula (6:30am).

Charlie is 45 today!

Happy Birthday Charlie, welcome to the W45s!

Another curious photo; I'm cleaning my camera lens. With my t-shirt. I'm not sure what Charlie is doing!

Good to see that the brilliant Australian movie Samson & Delilah has made the Academy Awards foreign film short list. There's also an article in today's Canberra Times on Liam Egan, AFI award winner for "best sound" for this movie. Liam's father is a good friend of mine, Bill Egan, with whom I worked and ran with for many years, and who still runs in the monthly handicaps with ACTVAC. We used to see him running on Saturday mornings when we trained at Aranda.

Now I had better go and hydrate ready for a track run tonight perhaps. Will I bite the bullet & race 1500m tonight? Is it OK to call it a race if it's 90-120 seconds slower than my pb? Will my achilles finally break at the higher "speed", will it suddenly improve, or will I just hobble along with it slightly sore as usual?

But first, here's Charlie again!

“The Science of Body Odour!”

Listened to an interesting conversation between our Melanie and a body odour expert on 666 yesterday. I wonder, does Melanie want to research her topics when she runs with us? Next she could do a segment on a threatened species of geese in the Parliamentary Triangle. Listen to Melanie Tait on 666 between 9-12 this week and next. I have not been paid for this promotion.

I use a product which is supposed to be (a) natural, (b) a deodorant, and (c) not an anti-perspirant. Why would a runner want to block perspiration? Would my best friend tell me if it wasn't working? The product has no odour. It's called DeoNat, reviewed here. http://www.runnersworldonline.com.au/default.aspx?s=gear-display&id=653. Note - this "product endorsement" is purely voluntary! I have to say that, because blogger doesn't like sponsored endorsements. And rightly so. I have not been paid for this promotion.

Some more results:
January Jogalong times: Thea 31:08
BBQ times from 13.1.10: Gary 30:17; Roger 31:05
I had no less than three other things on today and won't run. Speaking of clashes, I won't be able to run the planned Bush Capitol Marathon on the 31st July, I will be in Sydney that day. So I will have to review my plans and see what else to aim for this year. At the moment, it's the Weston Creek Half Marathon, then I don't know. Front runner is probably the Doomben Half Marathon in June.

Jennifer and Ewen both enjoying themselves, The shoulders of a couple of other well known people are in the picture. A rare occasion when a group of runners were not perspiring nor breathing heavily. Not as much as usual, anyway. I have not been paid to suppress this photo. Nor the ones I have in reserve for the future....

Rrrr!

Training at Parliament House last night in MUCH cooler conditions were Andrew, Bronia, Bronwyn, Ewen, Garry, Gary, me, Jodie, Joel, Katherine, Kylie, Leanne, Maria, Miranda, Neil, Noeline, Richard, Ruth, Steve, Tim, a Tony (visiting), Warrick & Yelena. Miranda left after the early run of 8.2k, while Gary, Ewen, Ruth, Maria & I doubled up. The hills session included 24 sprints up the south-East hill of Parliament House. Three of the highlights: a gaggle of 20 potential goslings jogged by while we ran the hills and I was so tempted to join them; a few drops of rain at one point was all we got of what hundreds of kms away was rumoured to be snow; and after training we enjoyed Caramello Koalas that Bronwyn had brought back from Hobart and had managed to keep away from Jodie, Suze, the dog, and the cat.

Last Thursday's official 800m times
M55 Ken White 2.29.84
M50 Rod Lynch 2.38.35
W35 Rachelle Ellis-Brownlee 2.47.52
M70 Tony Booth 2.54.53
W55 Kathy Sims 2.57.99

Noeline & Garry, who are enjoying longer interval training with us, at last year's speedygese dinner

bran nue dae

Happy Birthday blog, this feels like the new year!

100% approval
One person said they liked my “December Vetrunner” article that never got published, and none disapproved,  so I am trying again for February and have resubmitted the article. How to approach training in the heat is an issue that is still relevant for some months, I feel. The original article appeared at http://geoffmoore.blogspot.com/2009/11/handling-heat.html. But today is pleasantly cool, even if it only lasts one day.

Plans this week
Monday 18 January Parliament House Training 4:30pm jog an 8k, 5:30pm interval training session.
Tuesday 19 January ... we still have two weeks until the Summer Series begins. I will jog somewhere.
Wednesday 20 January 12:15pm is BBQ Stakes but I won't be able to get there this week.
Thursday 21 January normal Vets track will resume, including
...6:00pm spiral 4
...7:00pm 1500m
...7:15pm 400m
...7:40pm one hour run
I expect I will try to run a 1500m but the hour is an outside possibility.
Friday 22 January I will jog somewhere.
Saturday 23 January 8:00am is our final Pialligo training session.
Sunday 24 January 6:30am I will run 21k from the Zoo.

Just because I haven't posted a photo of Janene or Heidi for ten days...

Happygeese

five years blogging

Pialligo training yesterday
Attendees: Craig, me, Janene, Ken, Tony, Troy & Victoria plus Tony’s relative Adam visiting. We ran ten sprints slightly up hill: five of 140m and five of 240m.

Zoo run today
Victoria, Miranda & I ran a pleasant 16k around the lake starting at 7:00am. It seemed cool at the start but it very soon warmed up. Four tourists balloons were aloft today. On the way round we encountered Jodie & Bronwyn twice, going the other way. On both occasions Jodie was riding a bicycle and Bronwyn jogging. I wonder if Bronwyn managed to get a turn riding?

Miranda

Five years blogging
This completes five years of continuous blogging, a post nearly every day. Tomorrow this blog turns 5. All the posts are still here, in the archives in chronological order. There's lots of history: training and racing data, pictures, and good advice. I wonder if I will still be blogging in another five years' time? Hmmm, I don't see why not.

Troy: 19:31 >> 18:23 for 5000m

Thursday results
3000m Heat 1
Rod Lynch ~11:23
M50 Roger Pilkington 12:24.24 68.1%
Yelena Pearson 15:25.62

3000m Heat 2
W40 Amanda Walker 12:38.03 70.5%
W40 Bronwyn Calver 12:50.22 68.1 ** pb by 4 seconds **
M70 Tony Booth 14:34.02 69.6
W55 Ruth Baussmann 15:23.06 72.0
W60 Margaret McSpadden 16:17.22 71.0

5000m
M35 Troy Steinman 18:23.6 71.0% ** pb by 68 seconds **
M60 Geoff Moore 20:41.7 76.5
W45 Janene Kingston 21:32.8 72.9 ** pb **
Thea Zimpel 21:39.38 ** pb **
M50 Ewen Thompson 21:50.7 67.1

800m Handicap “official times” !
M70 Tony Booth 2.94.53
M50 Rod Lynch 2.78.35
W55 Kathy Sims 2.87.99
W35 Rachelle Ellis-Brownlee 2.87.52
M55 Ken White 2.29.84
!! I think there's a problem here !!
I was warming up outside when this was on so I have no idea what their real times were.

Summer Series
The ACT Cross Country Club welcomes runners and joggers of all standard to its 2010 Hobson Summer Series. The series named after club members Susan Hobson and Dave Hobson. Susan a four times Olympic representative for Australia and Dave a club life member.
All events are held on Tuesday evenings and start at 6.15pm sharp. They are low-key events and suitable for all. Non-members are most welcome at a cost of $6 or juniors $2 per event. Club memberships are taken at the events for those wishing to join. Where possible both runs will start together with runners running in opposite directions. The 2k was initially an event for younger runners but runners of all ages, particularly those new to the sport are most welcome to run the 2k. The following events comprise the 2010 Hobson Summer Series Program:
v 2 Feb - Boathouse West - Menindee Drive, Barton, near Hospice and just down from Russell Offices 2/5k events;
v 9 Feb - Boathouse East - Menindee Drive, Barton, near Hospice and just down from Russell Offices 2/5k events. (Opposite direction from week before same start/finish line)
v 16 Feb - North Curtin - Dunstan Street, Curtin off McCulloch Street which is off the Cotter Road. 2/5k events,
v 23 Feb - Stromlo Forest Park - Stromlo - Off Urriara Road which is off the Cotter Road. 2/5K Event. Please note this event may change venues due to reseeding of SFP.
v 2 Mar - Weston Park -Weston Park, Yarralumla off Weston Park Road, which is a continuation of Banks Street Yarralumla. 2/5k events.
v 9 Mar - Acton Ferry Terminal - Barrine Drive, Acton - This is on the West Basin of Lake Burley Griffin. 2/5k events.
v 16 Mar - Lake Ginninderra Belconnen - MacDermott Place off Joynton Smith Drive, which is off Coutler Drive Belconnen. 2/7k events.
v 23 Mar - Stromlo Forest Park - Stromlo - Off Urriara Road that is off the Cotter Road. 2/5K Event. Please note this event may change venues due to reseeding of SFP.

Everyone likes to shave a few seconds off their pb. Troy's improvement was more than a shave!

Scott running in Hobart

once more unto the breach

From track last night: 5000m 20:41. My km splits 4:10, 4:07, 4:13, 4:09, 4:02. I had a very sore left achilles all day and all night; there was an easterly wind; it was coolish but humid. It is a reasonable time for a 2010 pb should I do less well later.

A SWEDISH Weight Watchers group got a sign they might want to lay off the meatballs. When a group of 20 members gathered in Vaxjo, south central Sweden for their regular weigh-in, the floor collapsed, theSmalandsposten newspaper reported. “We suddenly heard a huge thud; we almost thought it was an earthquake and everything flew up in the air,” a member told the paper, according to a translation on Swedish news website The Local. "The floor collapsed in one corner of the room and along the walls." The smell of sewage quickly collected in the collapsed room. Luckily there was never any danger because the floor was only slightly above ground level, the newspaper said. No injuries were reported.

CANBERRA PRO-AM TRACK CARNIVAL- Saturday 16th January
The Ken Lorroway Memorial Gift Canberra Pro-Am Track carnival will be held this Saturday 16th January. The meet will take place between 2.00pm and 8.00pm at the AIS Athletics stadium.
Entries will be taken from noon on Saturday in the Commonwealth Room, and up to 30 minutes before start times of each series of scratch races. See Athletics ACT website for more information.

Reminder – 7am Sunday I am running from the zoo, 16k is the plan.

Cadbury Marathon report: McTaggart went straight to the lead and never looked back. McTaggart’s winning time of 2:23.40 was the fastest time by an Australian in Australia since the Gold Coast marathon in July last year. “The fact that I ran by myself from the gun and went that fast is really pleasing,” McTaggart said. The 32-year-old has a personal best time of 2:21.19 and yesterday’s result has invigorated hope that his ultimate marathon goal of running under 2:20.00 is still achievable. “I’m glad that I pushed myself hard and it’s a good omen that I might one day break 2:20,” he said. (From the NCGA newsletter)

Do we ever really change?

I was looking at photos of my grandchildren as tiny tots and realised how early their unique features show through. If you hadn't seen them for years you would still recognise them. I also found one of the earliest photos of me to see how much I have changed.
When I was a kiddie in primary school.

Now, according to Strewth's excellent camera work.

Not much difference!
I will be changing my profile photo soon...

Here are the official results from Hobart.
2010 Cadbury Marathon Cadbury Hobart 10 Jan 2010
1 Scott McTaggart 2:23:39 * New Course Record

2010 Cadbury Half Marathon
1 Mark Tucker 1:05:35 * New Course Record
3 Bruce Graham 1:13:05 M45 gold
110 Susan Archer 1:40:05 W60 silver
137 Carol Masters 1:46:46 W45 bronze
143 Clare Wall 1:47:12 W55 gold
153 Bronwyn Calver 1:48:18 W40 7th
273 Jodie Davis 2:26:54 W40 9th

Ballerinas are always on their toes. Why don't they just get taller girls?

What I'm talking up this week
Running "on your toes" is the way to go. Why? Because you can move your legs faster, you can run with a quicker tempo. It's not actually on the toes, it's a forefoot landing rather than a heel landing. With a heel landing your foot-strike has a decelerating effect; with a forefoot landing it can have an accelerating effect. The trick is to combine the forefoot landing with an active posture and an attempt to leave the foot on the ground for as little time as possible. An active posture is one with tummy in, back straight, head high but looking slightly down and shoulders down and relaxed, arms moving vigorously, hips forward, everything working to propel yourself forward and up, bottom not tending to sit. Leaving the foot on the ground for as little time as possible means focussing on lifting the foot off the ground rather than focussing on placing the foot on the ground. Simple, eh? There's no reason why a quick tempo should compromise stride length too much, and for us oldies a quick tempo is something we can develop more easily than a lengthened stride, because as we age stride tends to shorten.


FOOTNOTE: You get a pleasant surprise when you see your name “in print” – even when the context is a little – um - embarrassing! Just check out the other names mentioned!
http://runningmasters.blogspot.com/search/label/Jim%20Beisty%20Reflections%20of%20a%20Runner

Dinner photo

Graeme, Cathy, Caroline. Others in the background.