running writing

The weekend before last, I participated in the McLaren Vale Marathon. I’ve done this event 3 times before, in 2021, 2023 and 2024, where I achieved an all-time half marathon PB.

This year was a bit different. I had run the Adelaide half marathon 4 weeks earlier, and had subsequently bought a house and travelled to Brisbane for a 16 day truck driving course. Consequently, running was not front and centre in my mind, and replicating my 2024 performance would have been somewhat unrealistic. (I did manage to continue with regular runs while I was away, but only up to 10km, due to my course starting relatively early each morning, and me not wanting to get up at 4am to get a long run in!)

Knowing this, I had put my hand up to be a pacer at McLaren Vale, as soon as they announced that there were going to be pacers for the first time in this event.

I have paced a bunch of times before, mostly in the half marathon, as well as a couple of 10k races. All of my previous pacing experience was with SARRC. The usual process has been to approach the coach and see if a particular slot is available, and if so, put my name down for it. My ‘usual’ pacing time is 2:00, although I had done a couple of 2:15 when recovering from some stupid long ultras, and my last experience of pacing was 1:45 which probably would have gone better if it hadn’t turned out to be a course PB for me (I did manage to come in under the time, but it was WAY harder work than pacing should be!)

For McLaren Vale it was a bit different. I could tell that this pacing experience was going to be next level. For a start, I had to apply to be a pacer. I requested either the 1:50 or 1:55 slot, because it turned out 1:45 was that little bit too fast, and I figured 2:00 was too slow for me now. I had to submit a whole lot of results, including recent pacing results, as well as half marathon and marathon PBs and recent race results (all with links to official results, for verification purposes). I wondered what I was getting myself in for!

In the end I was given the 2:00 slot. With my limited running between Adelaide and McLaren Vale, that was probably a fair outcome. I didn’t run more than 12km in the 4 weeks leading up to the event. I hadn’t really practised my pacing too much (other than at parkrun the day before the event!) but I was sure muscle memory would kick in, having paced that time so many times before.

Not only was there an application process to get into the Pace Team, we were to be supplied with race kit (singlet, shorts and shoes). The shoes were New Balance, which I’d never run in before, but I seem to recall when I had a biomechanical running assessment done a few years ago, New Balance and Mizuno both came up as the best options for me, and I opted for the Mizunos. There were 4 different models to choose from, and I ended up with the Supercomp Trainer. I’d also tried the supershoe but could only get it in a size 10 and I normally wear a 10.5, and as soon as I put them on, I knew they weren’t going to be for me. (I mainly wanted the supershoe for after the race, I definitely did not need it to run a 2:00 half marathon, and it probably would not have been comfortable for that!) I’d taken the new shoes to Brisbane so I’d well and truly broken them in, running over 100km in them before the event (including Zillmere parkrun in Brisbane, which anyone who has done it would know, is not a great choice of parkrun to do in white shoes!).

The race kit was from LSKD, unfortunately I didn’t get a chance to test it out before the day because it only arrived on Saturday afternoon and I only got my hands on it on race morning. However Simon, who organised the pacers, assured us that he had experienced this with his pace teams in the past, and with ample anti-chafe cream, no-one had reported any issues.

While I was in Brisbane there was an online meeting for the pace team with Simon, to discuss expectations and plans for race weekend. He had previously organised pacers for both the Sydney and Ballarat Marathons, so he well and truly knew what he was doing! I was relatively experienced as a pacer but there were still some new things for me that came out of that meeting. First of all, turning off auto lap on our watches, because the kilometre markers we would be using to gauge where we were at, were ‘kilometres to go’ not ‘kilometres gone’. So the first kilometre marker we would see would be at 1.1km (20km to go) and if we were lapping at 1km, our time would be all out of whack. I had experienced this before in a race, and it definitely did mess with my head, so knowing this in advance was very useful! He also organised laminated pace bands for us all, so we would know what time we should be sitting on at each kilometre marker. Essentially, we were told to ignore what pace and distance our watches showed, because it was almost certainly wrong. As a pacer it was particularly important for us to get our pacing spot-on. (The aim was to be 15 seconds under the goal time at the finish line). I had never used a pace band as a pacer before but I had used them for my first few marathons and actually mostly just ignored them because I was running ahead of my goal time. Eventually I dispensed with using them altogether! But as a pacer, I think I will use them all the time from now on!

Previously I had had pace alerts set up (trying to keep between 5:35 and 5:40 pace) but Simon advised against this too. On the Saturday before race day I went down to Shiraz Trail parkrun, also in McLaren Vale, to meet up with some of the other pacers, and I did set pace alerts on my watch for this because I was using it for pacing practice, but found it particularly annoying, so quickly switched them off after I finished my parkrun!

One of the other things that was different this time compared to my previous pacing experience was that we were using chip time, not gun time. Essentially we would start our watches as we crossed the start line. In the past I’d always started my watch on the gun (to buy me a bit of extra buffer time), but this makes more sense. Anyone starting with us or just behind us, if they stay with us, will be under the time. And it makes it easier for us to maintain the correct pacing.

With the half marathon and marathon starting at the same time, and the marathon being 2 laps of the half marathon course, each half marathon pacer would have a marathon ‘buddy’ running at the same pace. For me, it was Nick, the 4 hour pacer. The pacers ranged from 1:30 half/3:00 full, to 2:30 half/5:00 full. I’m used to pacing on my own so this was another change for me.

A major change this time around compared to all my previous times running this event, was the start/finish area. Instead of being at a winery, this time the start/finish was in the main street of McLaren Vale. The bib collection/bag drop was in a hall, and the pacers had the benefit of being able to use the toilets in the hall rather than have to use the portaloos or public toilets. That was almost a bigger perk than the free race kit and shoes! It turned out to be a nice day, but had it been particularly cold or wet, having an indoor base would have been a bonus!

I arrived at the start area about 7:05 on Sunday morning for the 8:00 start. I collected my race kit and got changed, the singlet and shorts initially seemed super comfortable, so all signs were good! The pace flags were a bit different to what I used my last time pacing (that time, it was attached to a backpack, and the backpacks were a ‘one size fits all’ situation). This time they were attached to something that resembled a sports bra, with a pocket in the back to attach the flag. They also came in different sizes, so that made for a more comfortable fit. Other than the flagpole banging the back of my neck during the run (which I didn’t even notice most of the time), I hardly noticed I was wearing it (until I had to go under something low!)

The ‘gold standard’ was to be 15 seconds under the goal time.

It was interesting to see the other pacers as we went around the course (with several out and back sections) – some of the half marathon/marathon pacers were running pretty much together, others were a bit more spread out. Nick and I were pretty close together for most of the time, occasionally one of us would go in front for a while and then the other would catch up. We would always compare notes at each of the kilometre markers. The first kilometre was a bit slow (probably due to the it being the steepest in terms of elevation in the whole course, plus the number of people out there) but we quickly got back on pace and for most of the time we were sitting 10-20 seconds under the time indicated on the pace band. For me it was a relatively comfortable pace, and probably more so for Nick as I think he said he normally paces 3:30!

 I did mention to him at one stage that the half marathon pacers technically probably aren’t required, as the marathon pacers are also running at the right pace for the half marathoners. (Not that I wanted to do myself out of a job!) He said that it’s nice to have a second person out for the first lap. Also, it gives the option for the 2 pacers to split up a little bit so one is driving the bus and the other is sitting up the back. As a half marathon pacer it was certainly nice to have a second person along for the duration!

The elevation was certainly more than in previous years, which made me extra glad I’d decided to pace and not ‘race’ (I use inverted commas as I’m really only racing my own PB!). Weirdly, looking at Strava, my heart rate got up to 180 towards the end, I definitely did not feel like I was working that hard!

 

Nick very kindly offered all of us 2:00 half marathoners the opportunity to go around for another lap and complete the marathon with him and the (at that stage) one first time marathoner who was on his 4:00 ‘bus’. Surprisingly, I later found out, NO-ONE took him up on the offer! (I, for one, definitely had NOT trained for a marathon, I haven’t run more than a half marathon distance since September 2024!)

Approaching the finish line, and trying to get the magical 15 second buffer, I slowed down a little bit and encouraged other half marathoners to go past. In the end I crossed the line just under 30 seconds under 2 hours which I was pretty happy with!

The medal was beautiful, one of the nicest ones I’ve had! (We had to pay extra for it – which means as a pacer, with free entry to the event itself, I paid for JUST the medal, as I can’t resist a bit of bling, and I am very glad I did!)

After the finish I was looking for a coffee van – there wasn’t one, and I quickly realised why – we were on the main street of McLaren Vale – there were ample coffee facilities RIGHT THERE! I went to the Organic Store and had a coffee and a Snickers cake which was as delicious as it sounds!

Once again, another superbly organised event by Great Southern Runs. The volunteers were all friendly and helpful, the ‘race village’ had great vibes and plenty of facilities, and as mentioned above, we were spoiled for choice re where to refuel/rehydrate afterwards!

 I really enjoyed being part of the Pace Team and I hope to have more opportunities in future!

Adelaide Marathon race report – I’ve written a few of those (sigh!)

Traditionally I do a bit of a recap of all the previous times I’ve been involved with this event, but this year being the 9^th time, I reckon if you want to take a deep dive into the past, just take a look at the first part of last year’s report which sums it up nicely.

Originally I hadn’t intended to run Adelaide (half marathon) this year – I had signed up for Clare because it seemed like a good excuse to spend a day up in a lovely wine region, however 4 weeks out from the event, I returned from 3 weeks of army training (and zero running), did a fairly sluggish 16k run, realised that I was going to be very underdone for Clare, and didn’t really fancy that. Even though I do enjoy a nice Clare wine! So I deferred my Clare entry to Adelaide.

I had originally started training for Clare and got up to 18km before going away for army training, so I definitely had the distance covered, I just needed a few more long runs and a bit more speed. I did a few more 18k runs and broke it up with a 10k fun run (having not ‘raced’ a 10k in over 8 years). 2 weeks out from Adelaide I opted to do a ‘practice’ half marathon and you can read about that here.

1 week out from Adelaide I ran 12k which was meant to be around ‘race pace’, this is something I like to do before a half marathon – get used to running longer distance in the ‘speed’ shoes, but being a shorter run, it shouldn’t take so much recovery time.

I ‘decaffeinated’ for the week, and did 2 easy runs, on Tuesday and Thursday.

My pre-race meal was my traditional pizza, minus the wine this time, as I’d had a couple of glasses of wine with lunch (a lovely pasta, another great choice for pre-race day!)

Since Victor Harbor last year I have started using gels (I know, better late than never) and this week I happened to receive a shipment from Adelaide Marathon sponsor Pure. I had ordered a boatload of apple pie (my favourite) plus a few different ones.

On Friday afternoon after collecting my race bib from the marathon expo (I got through in record time) I legged it to the post office to collect my parcel, my last chance to get it before Sunday’s event. I had one gel in the pantry, and a very busy Saturday ahead so did not want to have to go and source a second one. I made it in time, and on Saturday I opened up the box to see what was in there. I had forgotten exactly what I’d ordered, but I had some lemon/lime caffeine gels and a few cola caffeine gels. Up until that point I hadn’t thought of using caffeine gels – typically I’ll have an energy drink half an hour before the start, and a Revvies energy strip around halfway (if needed). I’d never tried a caffeine gel before. So I thought, why not make the second gel a caffeinated one? What could possibly go wrong? (I went with the lemon-lime over the cola – I had tried the non-caffeinated lemon-lime one before so at least I knew the flavour was ok. Cola flavour can be a bit hit or miss. It NEVER tastes like Coke! I’ll try it another time!)

As usual I set 3 alarms, the first one for 5am. The half marathon started at 7am, with the marathon half an hour earlier. I had planned to leave as soon as I was ready, which was about 0550, but then I spent a good 5 minutes trying to find my keys. I still made it in plenty of time – I parked on Melbourne St, an easy 1.5k walk. There were already plenty of people there!

As it was a warm morning, I was able to go straight to the bag drop (normally if it’s a cold morning you’ll leave that until the last minute so you can leave your jumper on!), then do a short 2km warmup before braving the inevitable portaloo queue as the MC kept announcing how long we had to go before the start, and I did the math in my head to work out how long everyone was allowed to take so I could actually get in and to the start line in time. I did make it in the end but the one I used had already run out of flushing water so that wouldn’t have been a great experience for people later in the morning! (Fortunately there were separate urinals behind the block of portaloos so that thinned the queue out a bit!)

As mentioned previously I had an energy drink at 0630 (V Refresh Citrus Lemonade, VERY hard to find these days, I have managed to find a stash at a few servos but when that runs out I think I’ll have to find a new flavour!) and while queuing for the portaloos I had my apple pie gel. The timing (bag drop, warmup, portaloo, start line) worked out OK but another 5 minutes probably would have been nice (which I would have had, had I not lost my keys at home!)

There seemed to be a lot of pacers, the one I was looking for was 1:35, at first I could only see 1:30 and 1:40 so I put myself about halfway between those two, but then 1:35 appeared so I gravitated towards him.

Sub-1:35 (which would likely also be an Adelaide PB) was my A goal. My B goal was to beat the time I did 2 weeks earlier at Semaphore.

I lost the pacer within those 5km and had to work really hard to catch up. It was when going up a hill, in the 3rd kilometre, which according to Strava was by far the steepest kilometre in the course (28m elevation gain, with the next highest being 8m). I ran that split in 4:43 (not surprisingly, my slowest kilometre!) but the pacer was able to continue to run at 4:30 pace so got a bit far ahead of me. I did 4:12 in the next kilometre (25m elevation LOSS, again the steepest downhill and the only one in double figures) so I was technically on pace at 5km.

I did not write my report early in the week like I normally would, so the level of detail is not what it would usually be (many would. say that is a good thing!)

I’m splashing a few photos throughout the report, I can’t remember exactly when in the race they were taken, only that the ones where I was holding a gel would have been around the 9-10km mark. I only remember seeing the photographers going through the Botanic Gardens (which will be obvious when you see the photos!)

I saw a familiar face when running through the Gardens – not a photographer, but well-known rainbow-tutu-wearing unicorn Tamas, cranking some tunes as usual! Although I remember thinking it was unusual that he was cranking Tay Tay (I forget which song) instead of the usual Megadeth or Iron Maiden. Tay Tay is probably a bit more acceptable for the masses!

I had a cup of water at most of the drink stations – unlike at some recent races, I managed to avoid accidentally taking electrolyte drinks! I had my caffeinated gel just before 10km, when I could see that there was a drink station not too far ahead (so I could rinse my mouth out after the gel). I’m not sure if the caffeine helped at all but it didn’t seem to do any harm so I’ll probably do that again!

Despite being a bit slower than I’d hoped, I still managed to pull out a fast finish (Strava says I did the last 200m at 3:49 pace) and beat my B goal by about a minute. My official (net) time was 1:35:48, just under a minute slower than last year. I do believe it was a tougher course this year though so although underwhelming for me at the time, it’s not a bad time at all!

Participant numbers were huge! i finished 232nd overall in the half marathon which is not impressive BUT it was out of 2207 finishers so that’s a bit more respectable! And 27th out of 922 female finishers, and 4th out of 167 in my age category (just out of the medals for the second year in a row – if only they had 5-year age categories instead of 10-year, I would have made it!). In the marathon there were 761 finishers, 882 in the 10k and 321 in the 5k – I reckon that’s around 4000 finishers all up, which is a great number!

The event was superbly organised. Although I didn’t spend much time hanging around afterwards as I had some other stuff to attend to, from what I could see, the atmosphere was great, and the weather was perfect (albeit probably a bit warm for the marathoners!). There were plenty of drink stations, a well-marked course (a few less hills would have been appreciated!) and as always, fabulous volunteers at every turn! The photos turned out great too (would have been even better if not for my face) and were very reasonably priced!

All in all, I would have to say it was a great event and I am very glad I made the decision to defer my Clare entry and run Adelaide instead!

And of course, I’ll no doubt be back next year!

Today I ran a half marathon at Semaphore as part of the coastalfunruns Easter Bunny Run, which also included a 10k and a 5k.

coastalfunruns has been going for a while now, and you can read a bit more about it in my post from my first coastalfunruns event in 2017 – essentially the same course that I ran today for the half.

The half marathon course was: north for about 3ish km, back to the start, south for about 2ish km, back to the start, then repeat. All the distances started together at 7am, turning around at different points on the northward sections, and all turning around at the same southern point. The 5 and 10k runners did one lap and the 21.1km runners did 2 laps. The wind was coming from the south.

I’d only run one other coastalfunruns event after that one, technically not ‘coastal’ but a marathon around the 2.2km Uni Loop. In my defence, in case you’re thinking ‘that’s totally insane’, I was training for the 24 hour race in the same location and it seemed like the perfect way to get in a sneaky training run AND get a medal for it! I can’t imagine actually WANTING to do such an event for any other reason (sorry Chris! Although, there were a few other people out there that day!)

Back to today. It was very much a last-minute decision. Yesterday morning, my plan for today was to go out and run 21.1km to practise for the Adelaide half marathon in 2 weeks. And I was thinking that if I got to 18km and I wasn’t feeling it, 18km would be enough. I’d wear my race shoes, and use all the gels, energy drink etc – a real dress rehearsal.

Then sometime yesterday afternoon I remembered that there was an actual half marathon on today – a 7am start, which is what time I normally start anyway (albeit a bit further away than my normal run, but I’d still get up early to eat breakfast, so other than a slightly longer drive, really there was not much difference). When I checked the website around 4:30pm, entries were still open, and $30 for the half marathon, so I figured, it would be rude not to! So I did!

So I was up at 5am to eat breakfast and get myself organised to drive down to Semaphore. Having not checked the weather forecast, it was a bit colder than I expected, and I was in a tank top and shorts. It was also somewhat windy which did not really bode well as the entire course is along the coast! I opted to attach my bib to my top rather than to a race belt, because the thought of having the bib flapping in the wind for 21.1km did not spark joy. Also I forgot to put my race belt in my car, so really there was no decision to be made!

I did a few things differently to what I plan to do on race day. Firstly I did not have a week detox from caffeine – that’s pretty hard when I only decided to run the event less than 24 hours earlier! I also didn’t clip my toenails and I’m not going to post a photo but let’s just say I was glad I swapped the white socks for black ones! I didn’t do a warmup either – I figured I don’t normally warm up for a long run, so I could use the first 1-2km of the half marathon as a warmup. On Adelaide Marathon day I will definitely be warming up! Oh, and the day before Adelaide I will not be trying to smash a parkrun PB like I did yesterday (TRYING to smash a PB, not actually accomplishing it – if I had accomplished it, that alone would have been worthy of a blog post!)

Last Sunday I participated in ‘Run Army’ which is part of a larger event run in Brisbane and Townsville, a fundraiser for Legacy and aimed at members of the Army and also this year the Metropolitan Fire Service (which I almost applied for last year and still may). I did the 10km run, having not done a 10k ‘race’ since February 2017! It was a hot morning, and felt very hard, and surprisingly nowhere near a PB! I ran in my race shoes (Nike Vaporfly) and my legs felt like lead until about Thursday. I couldn’t understand it, I run 5k in those shoes almost every week at parkrun and never have any issues. It was only this morning that I realised what the issue was – for parkrun I don’t wear orthotics, but for longer distances I always have. So I made sure to put the orthotics in for today’s half!

I didn’t really try to keep to any kind of pace.  There was a little bit of elevation in the course (only 62m according to my Strava, which is nothing really), but the wind was the main factor affecting my pace. I started out around 4:30 pace, and in the end my average pace was 4:33, so I’d say I managed to keep a relatively consistent pace, slowing down a bit running into the wind, and towards the end, which is totally expected! And I managed to pull out one of my faster kilometres at the end, which I am always happy to be able to do, and I’m not going to say it was because I had the wind behind me at that stage!

The wind was very noticeable when running into it, but seemed to drop off when I was running with it – although the first few kilometres (wind assisted) did feel very easy.

I had an energy drink half an hour before the start, then a gel 15 minutes before the start, and the second gel between 9 and 10km.

One thing to note for next time, is that although there is a drink station at the start/finish (which the half marathoners pass 4 times), it’s not like a marathon drink station at a bigger event, with cups of water on the table. Runners could put their own drinks on the table, and I could see a cask of water there but no cups. And being unprepared, I didn’t have a receptacle on me. However, there were a number of public water fountains along the course, and being a cooler morning, it wasn’t really an issue. Note to self – probably read the race briefing!

The gels I like (Pure) are quite liquid in consistency so I find I don’t really need to consume them with water (although it is better if you do), which makes it easier, not having to coordinate it with where water is available. Normally on a training run I will have water on me.

Not that it is a race, this is an event that is very much focused on participation (the biggest trophy is reserved for the best costume, which was appropriately awarded to Colin who did the 5k in an inflatable Easter Bunny costume) but there WAS a first place male and first place female medal for the half. In my two previous coastalfunruns events I have finished second. Notably for the Uni Loop event I was beaten by Jenny who had (much like me today) entered last minute, thinking it might be ‘fun’. I didn’t know too many of the people running in the half today, so I figured I might be a chance! The out and back nature of the course means I could easily see where I was at!

I was ahead at the first turnaround point, but I wasn’t sure exactly how far. On the second lap I took note of when I crossed paths with the second placed female. and worked out she was at least 5 minutes behind me. So unless she had a hell of a back half in her, I should be pretty safe!

I was a bit worried about the second placed guy, who was only 300m behind me at the last turnaround, with about 1.5km to go. He looked like he might be able to put on a late surge but I managed to hold him off.

In the end I finished in (according to Strava) 1:36:59 which, although a bit slower than I hope to run at Adelaide (last year I scraped in under 1:35 but I’ve heard they’ve put a few more hills in this year, so sub 1:35 may be a bit ambitious! I got a sweet medal with the number ‘1’ on it, the first time I have ever got one of those in 45 half marathons! Turned out the guy who came first, a few minutes ahead of me, also entered yesterday – I happened to notice he was second last on the list of half marathon entrants (I was last)

I’ll tell you what, deciding to enter an event last minute definitely prevents overthinking it!

Overall I was happy with how it went, and hopefully I can replicate/improve in 2 weeks time!

It’s a great community event, very low cost (even though I entered last minute it only cost me $30, including a medal – and even at that low price, a significant percentage of that goes to cancer research!) and it’s definitely an event that caters to everyday runners as opposed to the bigger events which also cater to ‘normal people’ but definitely also attract elites. So for those who are a bit intimidated by turning up at an event full of elites, these events are definitely for you! Especially if you like dressing up, because that’s always a big part of it!

Although the course is not very exciting, it is nice to see the other runners several times throughout the event, particularly for us half marathoners on the second lap, where it could have otherwise been quite a lonely run!

Thanks and congratulations to Chris and all the volunteers for all the work you do to put on these events! Hopefully it won’t be another 6 years before I come out to another one!

On Sunday 1 December,  I, along with around 2600 of my closest friends, made the trip down to Victor Harbor to run in the Great Southern Runs Victor Harbor Half Marathon.

This event is huge! My first time running the half in 2022 (the less said about that sh!tshow, the better!), a total of 673 people finished across the 3 distances (21.1k, 10k and 5k), with 388 of those in the half marathon. Last year, that number grew to 1838, with 1145 in the half. This year, 1736 people finished the half, with 2594 finishers overall.

It wasn’t really on my radar for this year, as I felt like I had got my redemption last year. But then Beck and Kate decided to do it and of course I got the old FOMO and entered too!

Because of the huge increase in numbers last year, and in response to feedback, this year the 10k and 21.1k both started at 0700, so that was over 2400 people essentially starting at the same time. The idea was to avoid the faster 10k runners running into the slower 21.1k runners on the narrow part of the path. There were 5 start zones, with zone 1 being the fastest. I had been put into zone 1 by virtue of my estimated finish time which I think was 1:35 (much the same as the time I ran last year) – zone 1 was for anyone estimating a time up to 1:35. So I just scraped in there!

It was the same course as last year – a 2 lap course including 2 trips across the causeway to Granite Island.

I decided to try something new this time – nutrition! I was having coffee with Beck after our last Sunday run, and she mentioned she’d tried some new (Pure) gels, and they weren’t too bad. I had NEVER tried a gel before. In road races, I had only previously used Werther’s Original hard candy (in the very early days) and, in more recent marathons, mini protein balls. I don’t believe I had ever used any form of nutrition in a half marathon. I used to like doing ultra marathons because it is possible (and encouraged!) to eat real food! But everyone else seems to use gels, so what harm could it do? If anything, it could improve my performance, and at least it might give me a little energy boost! I decided at that moment that I would try gels for the half marathon. Beck gave me a lemon/lime one which I tried before my Thursday run (my last run before the half) and I didn’t feel like it really did anything for me, but we only ran 10km and normally you wouldn’t rely on gels for that sort of distance. I went and bought a few more (thanks, Black Friday sales!) and I thought I might try an orange one as well as the lemon/lime.

My preparation was pretty stock standard for me – easy running on Tuesday and Thursday, no caffeine after Wednesday, massage on Thursday (thanks Amanda!) and pizza for dinner on Saturday night!

(Pro tip – always order the biggest pizza. Future you will thank you for the leftovers when you get home after the race!)

I also had my work Christmas party on Friday night, a late night followed by an early morning which was probably not ideal, but I managed to get to bed before 2100 on Saturday night for the 0415 alarm so that wasn’t too bad! I was getting a ride with Kate who wanted to get there at 0600, so she was picking me up at 0445.

There was a bit of rain overnight and it started up again as we approached Victor Harbor – not ideal! But rain would be preferable to stinking hot, and worse, windy! We arrived around 0600 and managed to get what we thought was a pretty close park on Franklin Parade, but as we walked to the start area at Warland Reserve we realised that we could have got a whole lot closer, so Kate went and moved the car into what I would describe as a rock star park – pretty amazing considering how many people were there! (I think people see other people parking on the side of the road and they assume they won’t get any closer. Another pro tip – assuming you have plenty of time, always try to get closer – the further away parks will still be there if you can’t!)

While Kate was moving the car I thought I’d take the opportunity to beat the toilet queues at the public toilet block. Amazingly I did not have to queue at all – just walked right in! It was quite cold at the start so I was glad that I’d brought a jumper even though it was not at all cold when I left home. Then we caught up with Beck and her daughter Alice who had stayed the night in nearby Middleton, before I had my energy drink and a sneaky warmup. (My preferred energy drink, V Refresh Citrus Lemonade, appears to have been discontinued so I have been stockpiling it whenever I see it at a servo!) Then it was time for the first of my two gels – I decided to try the orange one and keep the lemon/lime one for around the halfway mark – the thinking being that if it tasted terrible I could wash it down with all of the water! It was actually not too bad – would have it again!

By this stage I had already put my bag in the bag drop area so I didn’t have my phone, and with all those people around I had no chance of finding Beck and Kate (especially as Kate was wearing all black and I didn’t know what colour top Beck was wearing) so I made my way to the start area. I was chatting with Micky who was aiming for sub-90 minutes so I made a mental note not to try to run with him – I feel like I should be capable of a sub-90 (my all-time PB being just under 1:32) but I’m not there yet! Then I saw Rob who is around my pace, but then realised he was doing the 10k and aiming for about 42 minutes. The same pace for a half would be under 1:29. So I was not going to run with him either!

Kate and Beck found me for a quick selfie and then headed back to one of the later start zones. (Kate asked me to write, for Future Kate’s benefit, that she needs to start in an earlier start zone next time!)

Other than potential congestion at the start from having so many runners starting at the same time, the other issue I could foresee was getting dragged out at too fast a pace. And that definitely happened! My first kilometre was 4:14 (bearing in mind that 1:35 half marathon pace is just under 4:30).

Because it was the same course last year, it is a pretty easy comparison. My 5k time last year was 22:15 and this year was 21:44 – a full 30 seconds faster, or 6 seconds per kilometre. Surely that wouldn’t come back to bite me later?

(Different course, but at the same stage in 2022 I was on about 23:22 and things just got worse from there!)

I remembered last year having a pretty strong headwind heading back towards Victor from The Bluff turnaround. It didn’t seem so bad this year. I certainly didn’t have anyone using me as a windbreak!

My hydration plan was to try to grab water at every drink station. I missed one early on, when I was a bit slow to reach for a cup, I tried to grab it from the very last volunteer on the station, and missed it, and absolutely was not going back! The only other one I missed was just before the second trip across the causeway, when I inadvertently grabbed an electrolyte drink (and as soon as I tasted it, promptly spat it out on the ground – not to my liking!)

Running across the causeway the first time, I was prepared with my gel (as you can see from the below photo) but not prepared to see a photographer (obviously!)

On the way back across the causeway, we were running on the bitumen side (when running out to the island, we ran on the spongy stuff the horses (for the horse drawn tram) walk on, and this was only wide enough for one way traffic). I did find myself getting a bit close to the spongy stuff and nearly tripping a few times!

The volunteers were all fantastic, and the marshals were particularly good at warning us about the tram tracks as we headed towards the causeway!

I had my gel around the 10km mark, knowing there was a drink station just after we got back off the island, and a bin in which to drop my empty gel packet, because I was not going to be one of those runners who drop their rubbish on the course! (I also brought a small zip lock bag to put it in, in case I was far from a bin at the time, and I could then shove it back in my pocket. Those things are sticky!)

My 10k time was around 43:45.  I have since looked up my 10k race times. It has been a REALLY long time since I’ve done a 10k race (over 5 years) and my 10k race PB is 44:02. My fastest 10k according to Strava is 42:22 (during my half marathon PB at GSR’s McLaren Vale event this year).

I hope I remember to read this blog before I enter Victor next year because I’m totally doing the 10k – only one lap, and an almost certain 10k race PB!

I seem to recall my 12k time was around 52:50ish – marginally faster than last year’s 53:14, but definitely slowing a bit at this stage. I always like to look at my 12k time because next year I am intending to run a sub-50 12k!

There were a few times in the second lap where I consciously backed off the pace for a bit, because I knew I’d gone out too fast and if I tried to keep the intensity up, the end was not going to be pretty! (I had forgotten I’d done much the same thing last year!)

I was passed by, and then caught up with, a girl called Ash who was also trying gels for the first time and when I caught her, my second gel had just kicked in, and she’d just taken hers. While chatting I learned that it was her birthday – what a way to spend it! (She ended up finishing about 30 seconds ahead of me – after her gel kicked in she was gone and I never caught her!)

After the 12km mark I stopped looking at my watch, I was pretty sure I was not going to get a PB and I really didn’t want to know what my HR was (I knew it was much harder work than last year!) At least I knew it definitely was not going to be a PW!

Like last year, from 21km on my watch, to the finish line at 21.1km, was the longest 300m I think I’ve ever run! Pleasingly I did manage to run that last bit at 4:13 pace which was my fastest pace for the whole run. I couldn’t have sustained it for much more than 300m but it’s nice to know I still had enough left in the tank to push hard for a sub-1:35, much like I did at Adelaide this year (My time was officially 1:34:50 net, or 1:35:04 on the gun – around 10 seconds slower than last year. That’s nothing!)

Weather-wise it was definitely getting warm towards the end (the reason for the 0700 start – and I was grateful to be finished just after 0830 before it really heated up. The humidity was supposedly 88% – that is something we’re not used to in Adelaide but we had been running in 80% humidity all week so it was good to be somewhat acclimatised to it!

After changing out of my running shoes into thongs, and having the Coke that Past Jane had put in my drop bag for me (thanks again Past Jane!), I went for a complimentary post-run massage (the guy organising it told me that my guy was blind and asked if that was OK, firstly I wonder who’s going to say no, then I said as long as his hands work, we’re all good!) and then met up with Kate and Beck for a quick walk in the ocean (it was actually getting a bit cold by then, believe it or not, so Beck and I just went for a little walk up to knee depth).

Because of all the people in town, we figured we wouldn’t get a table anywhere in Victor for coffee and brunch, so we drove to Middleton, as Beck had to go back there anyway to get her stuff. Turned out that Middleton was packed (we got probably the last table in the cafe, and apparently not long after we left, they were turning people away for coffee – they were definitely not expecting the crowd that turned up!) as was Goolwa, a bit further up the road. Victor itself had only a few venues open – definitely a lost opportunity for some of the local businesses!

We ended up just having coffee due to a 45 minute wait for food, and then I got a ride home with Beck and DEMOLISHED the rest of my pizza!

It was a really well organised event in general, but I think the start times need a re-think, and I know a lot of people have provided this feedback. It wasn’t so much an issue for me, but for people further back in the field, there was a lot of congestion. I guess that’s the curse of having such a popular event!

Thanks again to all involved – volunteers, organisers and fellow participants!

And again, fingers crossed I remember to enter the 10k next year!

 

 

This is just going to be a quick one – not too many photos, I just wanted to have a record of this in case I decide to do it again (or in case it can help anyone else!)

I have done the McLaren Vale Half Marathon a number of times. My first time was in 2014, and then I did it as a pacer, the day after running the Masters Games half marathon in 2015 (not recommended!) and again in 2016 when I was appropriately dressed as the Devil as the weather was diabolical! Both these times I paced 2 hours. I had also previously paced 2 hours at Adelaide, Clare and Barossa so I had quite a lot of experience in this role, but my last time pacing at any event was in 2019.

I ran the half again in 2017 just for me, and then for some reason I went back one more time in 2018 just for the 5k!

I think I was tempted into pacing this time around because a few friends were planning on running it, and I didn’t really fancy pushing myself but I expected there would be wine afterwards and I had FOMO! They didn’t end up doing it, but the seed was planted. It was 5 weeks after I’d run the Sydney Marathon, so I figured I’d be well and truly recovered by then.

I put my name down for 1:45, as I’ve done a number of halves in the past year and a bit, and most of them (OK all of them except Pichi Richi) have been under 1:35. So I figured 1:45 should be a nice easy cruise! (I was given the option of 1:50 but I thought 1:45 would be ‘easier’ – primarily from a mental maths point of view).

Other than pacing a significantly faster time, I was also pacing for the first time with a flag rather than balloons. Previously we had used helium balloons but they have a number of issues (absolutely terrible if it’s windy, environmental disaster, tendency to pop, very annoying for the runner behind you when they blow in their face). Now we had a flag attached to a backpack. Comfortable, reusable, less annoying for everyone else! I had never tried the flag before but those who I had spoken with, who had used both flag and balloons, all agreed that the flag was a much more comfortable option!

I went out and practised running a 1:45 half marathon the Sunday before, as my long run. I ran on the river where I like to do my solo long runs, as there are no roads to cross, and plenty of water and toilets if required! There was a bit of elevation, but I wasn’t too concerned about that as I was under the impression that McLaren Vale was flat and so it should theoretically be easier on the day!

I had pace alerts set up on my watch, to alert me if I was outside the 4:55-5:00 range. I had thought that I needed to average 4:59, but after that run, I realised that to be safe I needed to be more like 4:58. I ran 21.2km on my watch and was only about 20 seconds under the magical 1:45. (The extra distance was because GPS watches are never 100% accurate, and almost always tell you you’ve run less distance than you actually have). Based on my previous pacing experience, I felt like that run should have felt a lot easier than it did!

I didn’t do anything special that week, given that I wasn’t ‘racing’, so I did parkrun on the Saturday, giving my brand new Nike Vaporflys their first run. Not sure if that was the best idea, as I went out WAY too fast in the first kilometre, and although my time was not much better than what I’d been running in the old ones, my hip flexors felt very tight the next morning!

Because the previous week’s run had been hard work, I had an energy drink on the morning of the event (normally I would only do this for a ‘race’, certainly not when running as a pacer).

I arrived at McLaren Vale in plenty of time for a toilet stop before collecting my flag. (I figured that getting into a portaloo with a flag strapped to my back might be a bit challenging!)

The backpack itself was relatively comfortable, although it wasn’t quite as tight as I’m used to with a running backpack, even with the straps adjusted. It was very lightweight, and most of the time I didn’t even notice I was wearing it. (I normally would run a half marathon in a singlet unless it is very cold, but I thought a T-shirt was a better option if I was wearing a backpack, because chafing!)

Coach Kent gave me a few pacing tips before the start. I previously had always started my watch on the gun, however he advised me to start it when I crossed the line. After all, anyone who was hoping to use me as a pacer would presumably be with me at the start, rather than in front or or behind me. He also advised me to check my pace/time at the kilometre markers, rather than relying on the distance my watch told me.

I said before that ‘most of the time’ I didn’t notice I was wearing the backpack. I did, however notice it when going under trees and bridges – but thankfully most of this was over and done with early on.

I did manage to sit on my target average pace of about 4:58 for the first little while. Then came the hills that I had forgotten all about! Imagine if there was some way I could have known about that in advance…

One of the reasons I write these race reports is so I have something to reflect back on if I’m doing the event again – the details are so quickly forgotten! I have not one, not two, but THREE race reports from this very event – one of those was when I ran it as a ‘race’ as opposed to as a pacer, so that probably would have been a useful thing to have looked back on before doing this (and certainly before committing to running 1:45!). Will I look back on THIS report next time I decide to do something so silly? Probably not!

On the rare occasion that we weren’t running uphill, we were running into a headwind. I DID remember the wind from 2016!

I had quite a crew around me, and it was nice when people thanked me for pacing. I was hoping I didn’t let them down, because with probably 7km to go and seemingly no end to the hills, I was starting to think I wasn’t quite going to make my goal time!

Initially I was having difficulty judging my exact pacing from the kilometre markers, because the markers were not ‘on the kilometre’, but rather they were indicating how many kilometres were left. When we passed the first marker, which said 20km to go, rather than 1km done, I thought I was WAY off the pace, until I realised. From then on I’d check my watch every time I went past a marker, and gauge how far out my watch was. The last time I checked it was about 100m out, which is actually quite a lot when you’re trying to judge accurate pace!

Towards the end, particularly in the last 5km, I was able to gauge where I was at a bit more easily. If I was sitting just under 1:20 with 5km to go, it meant I had 25 minutes to run 5km, which meant 5 minute kilometres would get me there. See what I mean about easy mental maths? From that point on I knew that (barring more hills) I would be able to come in under my goal time.

Notably, there was no marker showing ‘1km to go’. I was talking to 1:30 pacer Lu after the finish and he was also looking for it to gauge where he was at with his pace. I finally reached a point where I knew it either was never there or someone had moved it – there was no way I was NOT inside the last kilometre!

I ended up crossing the line at 1:44:35 on the clock and 1:44:25 net time which I was happy with. After collecting my medal, a water and an apple (and then going to seek out a Coke!) I went to find some of my running buddies and sit down for a bit. I decided to leave the flag on for the time being, because I remembered after Adelaide half marathon wanting to go and thank the pacer but he had taken off his flag and I didn’t know what he looked like. I did have a few people come up and thank me afterwards which was nice!

As it turned out, I later worked out that in my 5th McLaren Vale half marathon I actually ran a PB! (OK 2 of the previous 4 were as a 2:00 pacer, but the other 2 I was going my hardest!) Which makes it even more ridiculous that I would be a 1:45 pacer – I’d never actually run McLaren Vale under 1:45 before!

Record crowds, fantastic weather, and as always wonderful volunteers made this another great SARRC event.

Would I pace 1:45 again? Maybe, but probably not at an event that a) has hills and b) I’ve never run that time at before!

Ah well – I’m kind of glad I did it, but mostly relieved that I managed to pull it off!

Best make yourself a cup of tea… I think this is going to be a long one!

Sydney Marathon, despite being on the verge of becoming one of the World Majors, had never particularly interested me. Firstly because it is hilly and hills are not my friend (well, the uphills anyway – I don’t mind a bit of downhill!), and secondly because it always falls on the same day as Adelaide’s biggest running event, the City-Bay Fun Run. Having done the half marathon for probably the last time in 2023, my goal was to run sub-50 minutes for the 12k this year. It was also the 50th anniversary so I had entered as soon as entries opened – it was a no-brainer!

Then, somewhat inexplicably, I received an email advising that I had been invited to participate in the World Age Group Championships at the Sydney Marathon. I didn’t know much about the Age Group Championships but I had noticed people at Chicago (where the Championships were held last year) with age group bibs on their backs. I wasn’t particularly high in my age group but somehow I still got an invitation. I figured it was probably because the event was being held in Australia, and as an Australian, they thought I would be likely to attend.

I put the question out to Facebook. City-Bay for the 50th anniversary and a likely PB, or a probably once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to run alongside some pretty elite runners? Of course almost EVERYONE told me to go to Sydney. There was an additional cost for Sydney though – from memory it was around $400 for the race entry plus a few functions and some additional perks – not to mention flights and accommodation. But I weighed up the options, and Sydney won out in the end – again, when would I ever get this opportunity again? City-Bay will still be there next year!

I did a 16 week training programme, loosely following the programme I used for my first 2 marathons way back in 2014 and 2015. This time around, I only used the programme to determine my long run distances. (I was running 5 times a week in 2014, and have since dropped to 4 times, but it does not seem to have had any negative impact on my performance)

During the 16 weeks I did 2 half marathons (Pichi Richi in June and Adelaide in August), and unlike 2014/2015, I would have a ‘drop down’ week the week before the event, so I could give the 21.1km a good crack. Consequently my overall distance covered in the training block was a bit less than what was programmed. (The programme had 444km over the 16 weeks of long runs, and what I actually did was 406km. Averaged out over 16 weeks, that’s actually not a lot). In terms of runs over 30km, my programme had me doing 4 with the longest being 36km, and I actually did 3, with the longest being 34km. Having done Pichi Richi Marathon in 2022 on the back of only one 30km run, I knew that this would be enough.

What I didn’t do was train for the hills. I knew I should, but I didn’t. I have been doing quite a lot of strength training and also speed training which I had only started doing at the start of the year after many years of NOT doing it, so hopefully that would make up for the glaring lack of hill training!

Taper week was pretty standard. I did my last long run of 20km the week before, breaking in my new shoes – immediately after attending a ‘come and try’ day at the Metropolitan Fire Service which included dragging a 70kg dummy and running with a fire hose, among other things. So I guess that was good preparation for ‘running on tired legs’? I forgot to do my usual caffeine detox (I actually only remembered when I went to order my post-parkrun coffee on the Saturday!) but otherwise I ran Tuesday and Thursday, with Tuesday being a hill run (because, better late than never?) and Thursday being a slightly shorter but quicker run. As is part of the regular routine, I had a pre-race massage on Thursday night.

I flew to Sydney on Friday morning. Friday was a bit hectic, after landing at the airport and taking 2 trains to get to my accommodation (Blues Point Hotel in McMahon’s Point, chosen because it was a 15 minute walk to the start line, and with the start being at 6am, that seemed like a good option!), I quickly dropped off my bags and headed back to the train to get to the expo to pick up my race pack.

And there I discovered one of the perks of being part of the Age Group Champs, we had our own dedicated check-in area and were able to jump the queue which I was very grateful for as I needed to be at the wharf at 4:30pm for the first event of the weekend, a sunset cruise!

I breezed through the expo, I didn’t really ‘need’ anything and it was probably for the best that I was in a rush!

While waiting in line to get on the boat, someone called out my name, it was Pirjo, who I had met in the hostel bar after the Chicago Marathon, and she was also part of the Age Group championships. Not knowing anyone else that was part of it, it was nice to see a familiar face! She introduced me to her friend Karen from Scotland, and also Sarah from England who they’d met on the flight over.

It was a lovely night for a cruise, albeit a bit cold up on the top deck by the end! I was glad I’d chosen the earlier cruise (with about 1800 people involved in the championships, there were 2 separate ‘sailings’) as we got to see the sunset.

I grabbed some Thai food from a place just down the road from my hotel, and headed back to my place. It is a pub but my room was very spacious and comfortable. Friday night was a bit noisy out on the street which I thought might not bode well for a good sleep on Saturday night, but the pub noise itself was not an issue. There was a small kitchenette with a fridge – enough space for me to put my energy drink and milk. (I had also brought a Coke for my drop bag to have after the race, but I found out from the briefing that we weren’t allowed cans in our drop bags – so that would have to wait till I got back to the hotel!)

Saturday morning I went on the new Metro for the first time – the Metro is a new fully automated train that runs way underground – the Sydenham line goes under Sydney Harbour which was a bit of a novelty! You know you’re going way underground when you descend the several very long escalators! It’s very new – I think this particular line only opened about a month ago. The stations are very modern and clean, as are the trains. The Metro was recommended as the best way to get to the start of the marathon at North Sydney, with Victoria Cross station being slightly closer to the North Sydney Oval than the North Sydney train station.

I got off at Gadigal Station and followed my Google Maps directions to Pirrama parkrun, a relatively new parkrun at Pyrmont (I had planned to do North Sydney but as it is so close to the marathon start, it had been cancelled for that day) and quickly found myself in a crowd with other people clearly heading the same way, including a couple from Emerald in central Queensland who happen to be the Event Directors for the parkrun there!

I met Voula from Adelaide there, she was initially going to do the marathon but due to injury she dropped to the 10k and then decided just to come and support other runners doing the marathon. I ended up running the parkrun with her, it was very congested (over 600 people, with a previous attendance record of around 400 – but they were definitely prepared for big numbers!) and I was glad I was not trying to run fast, as it would have been quite frustrating! It’s a 2 lap course, so even if you were well ahead, you’d hit the slower runners/walkers on the second lap. I saw Ross from Scotland, who I had met on the cruise, he was doing his 50th parkrun and definitely was not taking it easy! I also saw a fast guy from Toowoomba with a pram who I think I met at my local Lochiel parkrun a few weeks ago. Voula and I stopped for a selfie with the Harbour Bridge in the background! It was a really nice event and course, I think it would be nice to see what it’s like with fewer people, but it was a perfect option for a marathon weekend!

Amazingly the wait for coffee wasn’t very long, given the crowd! We both got a takeaway and walked back towards Voula’s accommodation, as I was heading to the Opera House for a group photo with the 1800 Age Group athletes. The Opera House steps were closed to the public so it was pretty special to be allowed on there! Trying to assemble the crowd for a photo was like herding cats, but eventually they managed to get us all in position and the photo turned out pretty well! I strategically put myself behind Pirjo who was holding a Finnish flag, so I might be able to see myself in the photo later – she ended up being in the very front row so that worked out well!

Following that I messaged my cousin who lives in Manly, to see if she might be free to catch up (I am so bad at planning ahead – last time I was in Sydney I think I messaged her the day before to see if she wanted to meet for lunch!) and fortunately she was, I did warn her I was still in my running gear as it made more sense to take the ferry straight from there to Manly than to have to go all the way back to my hotel for a shower first. I did end up spending quite a lot of the weekend commuting via various different modes of transport!

It was a lovely day to hang out near the beach for a few hours, and I had a nice healthy lunch, knowing that dinner was going to be my traditional pre-race pizza. And I ran into Pirjo and Karen not once but twice – not sure if they were stalking me or vice versa!

Eventually I got back to the hotel around 4pm, time for a shower and a bit of time to re-charge before taking the Metro once again to meet Ryan from Adelaide (who was also doing the marathon) for dinner at Macchiato. I had booked dinner for 5:30, and it was certainly good that I did, because when I arrived there was a queue to get in and we would have faced a lengthy wait for a table had we not booked. Seemed like a very popular place among runners! (I had actually been to this place once before, in 2015 when I came over for City2Surf!)

I had pizza and wine, and Ryan had pasta and wine. (He wasn’t going to have wine because he assumed I wouldn’t, but as soon as I said I was going to have one, he quickly joined me!) I saved 3 slices of pizza for my post-race recovery meal – assuming it didn’t walk from the fridge before I got back!

I was in bed probably by about 8:00, with my alarms set for 3:55, 4:00 and 4:05, with the plan being to leave at about 4:30 to walk to the start. The Age Group athletes had the privilege of a race-day bag drop (unlike everyone else, who had to drop their bags at the expo by Saturday), but that closed at 5:15, so I wanted to be there well before then.

As I’d been out most of the day and not drunk nearly enough water, I had been hydrating late in the day so I had to get up several times early in the night. Fortunately it was a quiet night in the pub and on the street so other than the early awakenings, I actually had a really good sleep! And as a bonus I woke up 5 minutes before my alarm!

After a quick breakfast of granola, I left the hotel around 4:25. It took me longer than I expected to get to the start area, partly because it was uphill, but also because it seemed like we did a full lap of North Sydney Oval before we finally got in. It was a separate ‘warm up’ area for the age groupers and the elites, which was nice as it was a little less hectic than I imagine the main start area would have been! My only complaint was not enough toilets – I didn’t see any portaloos, just the fixed toilets at the Oval, and with 100% off the people present wanting to use them all within a fairly short space of time, a few portaloos would not have gone astray! The bag drop was very well organised, there were different lines depending on bib numbers, and there was no queue to get to it (I had been told from people who had participated in the Age Group Championship at Chicago last year, that the bag drop was a mess, and all the bags just got chucked in together. With everyone using the same bags (supplied at check-in), it would be pretty hard to find yours afterwards if there was not some kind of order to it!

After bag drop, with the toilet queue being pretty long and not moving very quickly, it was time to move into our ‘pens’ to head to the start line. Each ‘pen’ had 2 age groups in it – I was in W45-49 and we also had the F50-54 group in with us. I had decided to try to start near the back, as I didn’t want to get dragged along . The automatic qualifying time for W45-49 was 3:13, and for W50-54 was 3:21. Given that most of the athletes there would have been time qualifiers, and given that my marathon PB was 3:26, I assumed most of the people in my pen would be faster than me. As I headed towards the back of the pen I saw Pirjo and Karen so it was nice to have people to chat with as we waited for the start!

Eventually we made our way from the oval to the start line on Miller St. Our official start time was 6:01, just behind the elites. (Looking at my ‘gun’ and ‘net’ times, I crossed the line 19 seconds after the gun.) Pirjo and Karen took off immediately and I didn’t think I’d see them again until after the finish.

My goal was around 3:30 but I wasn’t overly optimistic about that, given the hills, and the fact that it was quite windy. I had hoped to run with the 3:30 pacer at least for the first half, but it turned out that the age group wave didn’t have any pacers – they would be starting with the main waves, behind us. So, probably not particularly useful to me.

I hadn’t studied the course too much (why ruin the surprise?) but I had had a brief look at it the day before and noticed a section running down Anzac Parade and back that I thought probably wouldn’t be very pleasant (having lived in Sydney and worked in that area, I didn’t recall it being particularly scenic!) I also thought, the City-Bay which I would otherwise have been running, is primarily along Anzac Highway, so I guess it seemed appropriate that I would be running along a road called Anzac! There was also a lap around Centennial Park which looked quite big!

The most important parts of the course though, were the start and the finish. The finish was outside the Opera House, but more on that later!

The start was downhill – my first kilometre was 4:22 but in my defence it was 30m elevation loss in that first kilometre – the steepest descent for the whole marathon! Very soon after the start we hit the iconic Sydney Harbour Bridge, which had been closed to traffic for the event, so it was quite a privilege to be able to run along the centre of the road rather than the usual congested pedestrian path on the side! That was where I first saw the photographers. One mistake I made several times was smiling for a photographer and then getting back to business, forgetting that where there was one photographer there were usually 2 or 3, so the subsequent photos probably weren’t so great!

The drink stations were frequent and well stocked. I only wanted water, it took a few stops before I remembered to only grab the WHITE cups rather than the black ones. I think I managed to get water at every stop. The first few drink stations were on the left hand side, but after that they were mostly on the right which firstly took a bit of pre-planning to get across to the right in time, dodging other runners. Also grabbing a cup with my right hand took a bit of coordination! I MOSTLY got my empty cups into the bins – but on the few occasions that I didn’t, I blame the wind! It was WINDY!

As one of the not-so-fast age groupers, it was inevitable that I would be passed by many other runners along the way, including large groups around the pacers. I remembered not to try to stick with the pace groups, as even though they were coming from behind me, they were running a LOT faster than me! I only hoped that I wouldn’t see the 3:30 pace group, as that would mean I definitely was not going to make my time goal!

The volunteers out on course were great, there were so many of them! They were super encouraging, and many of them were holding motivational signs.

The support from the crowd was great too. I remembered thinking, as we headed towards the start line, “This FEELS like a major”, and the crowd support definitely added to that feeling! Lots of motivational signs (“You run better than the government” was one memorable one that is always relevant!) and at least one “Tap here for a power up” (I think I hit the same one twice).

It was hilly, and windy at times. I was able to run all the hills, although there were a few times towards the end where I seriously considered walking. The downhills were great though (what goes up must come down, right?)

At approximately every 5km there was a timing point. Although I had my watch covered by my arm warmer the whole time, I did take note of the time clocks when I saw them. I did not know at the time how far behind the gun I started, but if the time on the clock was under 5 minute/km pace, I knew I was on track for my goal 3:30 time. I had no idea where the hills were, and how steep they would be, so consequently I did not know if it was realistic to hold onto this pace, but I figured I’d just go for as long as I could. Time didn’t really matter that much but I had done a solid training block so it would be nice to get reward for my efforts! Plus, there was a bit of added pressure, being part of the age group championships – I just wanted to be not last in my age group, but I kind of wanted to justify being there!

At one point we ran along the water, I think that was at Pyrmont, actually along part of the parkrun course, and I was instantly taken back to Liverpool in 2014 where I did my first ever marathon, and the last 6km or so was along the waterfront and it seemed to go on FOREVER! (In Sydney, however, this section was FAR from the finish!)

There were a few out and back sections. Normally in a home race I can tell whether the people coming the other way are ahead of me or behind me, because I usually know a few people and I know if they’re faster or slower than me. I didn’t see anyone I knew, I was looking out for Pirjo and Karen but I didn’t see them, so I figured they were well ahead of me!

At one point in the latter stages I heard a familiar voice coming from behind me, it was Chantel from Adelaide, I didn’t know her very well, only from the times she has passed me in other races! She was also part of the age group championships and went on to finish a few minutes ahead of me.

Somewhere around this time I also nearly caught up with Pirjo, who was easy to spot in her Finnish flag top! Just before I caught her though, she must have put on a burst of speed and then she was gone!

There was one more big hill to climb before the end, and then we were well and truly into the home stretch. We ran down Macquarie St, and I was reminded of walking from parkrun the previous day, to the Opera House, which was a reasonably long walk. Somehow I had in my mind that I was on the same road and that once I turned the corner the Opera House would be still a fair way away. Imagine my surprise and delight when I went around the corner and the Opera House was Literally. Right. There!

Thanks to the lovely downhill finish, I had enough legs left to do a fast finish (4:23 pace for the last 400m – not quite as fast as my sprint finish at Adelaide a few weeks back) and I could see the time clock read 3:27 so I knew I had managed to achieve my goal time!

My official time was 3:27:38 which I was super happy with. I took a couple of selfies with my medal before the 500m ‘walk off’ to the recovery area (to avoid congestion at the finish line we had been instructed to keep moving). As if 42.2km wasn’t enough already! At the recovery zone (another perk of the Age Group Champs, we had our own dedicated recovery area) I collected my bonus medal and my drop bag, happy to get my shoes and socks off, and also to change into my finisher shirt! (I did see a few people running in the marathon wearing the 2024 finisher shirts, which we were given at check-in, but which superstition usually dictates you do NOT wear until you’ve actually FINISHED the race!)

I found my Scottish/Finnish crew and hung out in the recovery area for a while before we headed to the main recovery area which was actually better as there was more of a party vibe there, plus we could get drinks and I could finally get a post-race Coke! After hanging out there for a while longer, I headed back to Circular Quay to get a ferry back to my hotel for a shower and change, not to mention leftover pizza and another Coke!

I then went and met Voula and a few others at the Opera Bar for a couple of drinks before heading to the Ivy for the official Age Group post-race function, for a few more! A great way to finish an awesome weekend!

I would recommend this event to anyone thinking about doing it. The course, while a bit convoluted, takes in some of the most iconic parts of the city, and the crowd support is fantastic. The finish line atmosphere is great, and if they could have just taken out the hills (or maybe if I had actually trained for them), it would have been perfect!

THANKS to all the wonderful volunteers and organisers for putting on this fabulous event. Hopefully Sydney gets awarded Major status and continues to grow as an event! Not sure I’d do it again, but I’m really glad to have done it this year!

Adelaide Marathon 2024 – what a day!

I’ve been involved with this event on and off since 2014.

In 2014 I went out to cheer on running buddies Brandy and Jim doing their first marathons, standing outside the Zoo wearing a tiger onesie and holding up a motivational sign which I still have in the boot of my car to this day!

2015 was my first experience of pacing, pacing 2 hours for the half marathon.

I then ran the marathon in 2016 with Beck, finishing for the first time on the Adelaide Oval.

Back to ‘official’ pacing in 2017, this time pacing 2:15 which was a bit more of a challenge!

 

The following year the marathon fell not long after I’d done a 100k race so I opted for the 1 hour pacer role in the 10k.

Then I went back to familiar territory in 2019, donning a silly costume and pacing the half marathon!

After a break of quite a few years, I ran for the first time ‘just for me’, doing the marathon last year and managing a big PB!

This year I thought I’d give the half marathon a crack, given that I would be doing the Sydney Marathon 3 weeks later. Barring disaster, it would be a guaranteed Adelaide half marathon PB!

I had been discussing the marathon with my Mum, whose birthday happened to fall on the day, and she said “I should do it!” and I replied “Yes you should!” and proceeded to sign her up for the 5k.

I had a pretty easy week in the leadup, switching my usual speed session for a ‘normal’ Tuesday run, and then a relatively cruisy Thursday run. I’d gone off caffeine after Monday morning.

On Tuesday I was running with Riesje who was also running the half and she asked me if I had a time in mind, and I’d been saying sub-1:40 as it’s not a super flat course, and she told me surely I’d be faster than that! So I changed my goal to sub 1:35, which seemed reasonable given that since I first broke 1:35 at Barossa last year, I’d done 6 half marathons (including Barossa), and all of them except the two Pichi Richi halves have been under 1:35.

The weather was looking a little dodgy, rain was forecast but hopefully would hold off until after the event. I put out a T-shirt and a singlet along with my shorts, and would decide on the morning which one to wear. I had my arm warmers ready, and I was wearing my Nike Vaporflys (I’d run 15km in them the previous week, to make sure they were still good for more than 5km – they’re looking a bit worse for wear but they’ve still got some life left in them!)

Saturday night I had the traditional pizza and wine – and for a change my cats didn’t try to grab the pizza out of my hands! (One of them sat on the box to try to stop me eating it, which was most unhelpful!)

I had arranged to go in with Mum as she was happy to get there super early (I was aiming for 0630 for a 0700 start, her race started at 0730) and was also happy to pay to park in the Adelaide Oval carpark which is a lot closer than where I would have parked as I HATE paying for parking if it is avoidable!

Sunday morning turned out to be surprisingly warm, so not only did I wear my singlet rather than my T-shirt, but I didn’t end up even needing my arm warmers at the start – I took my hoodie off about half an hour before the start and was ready to go!

Adelaide Oval was open so we were able to use the proper toilets which is always a huge plus – especially as there were minimal queues and PLENTY of toilet paper!

After having my energy drink and leaving my bag at the bag drop, I went for a 1.6km warmup before making my way to the start area. (Side note – there was an event on after the race called the Extra Mile, and money was raised for charity for each person who did it. I didn’t end up doing it, but I like to think I went the Extra Mile BEFORE, instead of after, the race!

I found my spot in the start area, I hadn’t realised before that there would be a 1:35 pacer – how perfect, I could just run with him and let him do all the work! It was the same guy, Terry, who had been the 2:30 pacer for the 30k at Hills to Henley.

Much the same as at Hills to Henley, I started with him but soon left him behind. My first indication that this may have been ill-advised, was when I looked at my watch after 1km and saw 4:09 (bearing in mind that 1:35 would be around 4:29 pace).

This was my 39th half marathon. I have been a pacer quite a few times but I don’t recall ever running WITH a pacer for more than brief moments. Even though there was a pacer running the EXACT pace I needed to run, somehow I thought I could just run on ahead and what could possibly go wrong? With experience comes – I don’t want to say arrogance, but some kind of ‘know-it-all-ery’ – you’d think by now I would have learned from past mistakes and yet here I was!

At the 9km mark the 1:35 pacing bus caught up with me and from then until about the 17km mark I was just hanging on to them! So I’d wasted all that energy for nothing – note to self, don’t do that again next time! (You know I will…)

It was great to see so many familiar faces out there. I didn’t see anywhere near as many people I expected to who were actually in the race (it was mainly just half marathoners and marathoners I encountered) but there were a lot of people I knew out there volunteering – special shout out to Tamas in his unicorn onesie blasting some loud heavy stuff in the Botanic Gardens!

There were quite a few other musical interludes, most notably the African group at the bottom of Morphett St bridge which made probably the least enjoyable part of the course a lot more enjoyable!

I don’t normally fuel during a half (I know, I should!) but I have been practising fuelling for the marathon so I thought I’d practise that in this race. So I had a protein ball every 6km. One of them (I think it was the 12km one) was slightly delayed as we were running past Elder Park at the time and I was almost certain they’d put a photographer there and I did NOT want a photo of me stuffing my face! I was right too – as soon as I’d gone past him, out came the snack!

Just before the photographer a guy called out from the sidelines “Stick with the plan”! I said “What plan?” Where was he at the 1km mark when I could have used that advice! It was too late now!

I remember when we got to 14km I said ‘just a parkrun and a bit to go’ and then I said that actually wasn’t very helpful as parkrun is never (for me anyway) an easy 5km!

I was telling Terry about how I thought I knew better than running with the pacer and it turned out that I didn’t, he suggested I should stick with him until about 5km from the end, then take off. I said that 5km was probably a bit ambitious and I really should stick with him until about the last 500m!

As it turns out, I ran with him from the time he caught me at 9km, until about 17km (so 4km to go – he was closer in his estimate than I was!)

(I tried to find him at the end to thank him but couldn’t see him – with the giant flag attached to his back he should have been easy to spot but if I were him I probably would have ditched it as soon as I crossed the finish line!)

I found him really helpful as a pacer, better than I ever was! He would tell us all the pace at each kilometre marker, and he let us know when drink stations were coming up (and on which side) and when people should be thinking about taking their gels.

I planned to get water at every drink station, and I just missed out on one, which was probably around 16-17km and was the only one I recall being on the right side – being left handed I couldn’t quite coordinate grabbing the cup in my right hand, and at that stage the drink station volunteers were run off their feet and there were only a few cups out on the table, and I did not want to slow down, so I missed out on that one! (I guess this is one example of where left-handers have an advantage – I had no issues with any other drink stations other than that one!)

The paper cups were good too – grab the cup, bend it to make a spout, get most of the water in the cup, crush it and drop it in the bin – I think I managed to successfully get ALL my cups in the bin this time – I reckon that’s a PB for me!

My average pace for that last 4km (excluding that pesky last 0.1km) was just under 4:34, but I had banked enough time that I potentially could still make my sub-1:35 goal – it was going to be a near thing though!

To finish, we had to run past the finish line (brutal!) then do a short out and back before coming back on the path around the Adelaide Oval.

I was momentarily confused by a sign with an arrow pointing towards the right that said ‘Finish’ but then I saw it said something about the ‘Extra Mile’ and decided instead to follow the runners in front of me going left, who looked like they were heading towards the finish line.

Coming into War Memorial Drive, with the finishing arch directly in front of me, I looked at my watch and I was just over 1:34 – it seemed REALLY far away and I thought, time for a sprint finish!

And so I went, for what seemed like forever, checking my watch about 3 times along the way, crossing the line with my watch reading 1:34:54 (official time 1:34:52, and my gun time was 1:35:00:06!). Strava tells me my average pace for the last 200m was 3:37 (as compared with my overall average pace of 4:28)!

So it was nice to be able to pull out a sprint finish at the end of a half marathon but it was only due to poor decisions earlier that I actually NEEDED to do that!

The medal was really nice too, SARRC has definitely stepped up their game in recent years – I have a nice collection of Adelaide Marathon Festival medals and the more recent ones are up there with some of the best I’ve had!

I went and found Mum, she had had a good run, and as I went to get my bag from the bag drop I had a look at the 5k results and discovered that she had actually won her age category, which she had no idea about when I told her! That’s a pretty good birthday present! So of course we had to hang around for the presentations!

After that she dropped me home and I did the calculations and had a quick shower and change and jumped in the car to head back to the Oval to see Cecile finish her marathon, she was hoping for sub 4 hours (on her third attempt) and I worked out that if I could manage a close park, I would be able to get there in time! (My newish shorts ended up causing a little bit of chafing which I haven’t experienced before – time to invest in some Bodyglide!)

I managed to get a free park just up from the Oval and quickly made my way back to the finish area with my medal on (I confused a lot of people who wondered if I had actually run because I was in ‘normal’ clothes!) and found Michael, who had been following Cecile around the course on his bike, and he said she was not too far away – so I’d just made it!

I saw her come across the line in a few minutes under 4 hours – she was SO excited and we were all very happy for her, it was well deserved! She even also managed an age category placing (which we didn’t realise until we were at the pub several hours later)!

After she went home and the rest of her cheer squad made their way either home or directly to the pub where we were booked in for lunch, I waited to see a few other running buddies, Kristina and Lachy, finish, and then the timing was perfect to get to the pub. Even better because I got there JUST before it started to rain!

We were sitting inside having lunch when the rain properly came in – the runners/walkers would have all been finished by then but I suspect some of the volunteers would still have been out packing up! And the rain was pretty heavy too – we were all grateful it waited until later in the day!

All in all it was a fantastic day and yet another superbly organised event by SARRC! Thanks to all the organisers and fantastic volunteers (and musicians!) for making it such an awesome experience!

Last Sunday I participated in an event I’ve never ‘properly’ done before but it was always on my radar – the SARRC Hills To Henley, a 30km run along the length of the Torrens Linear Park from Athelstone to West Beach.

One of the first running events I ever did was the 2013 Hills To Henley, in my first year of running. At that time there was a 15km option, an out-and-back from the finish line, heading up the river towards the city. It was the longest distance I’d ever run and from memory I did it just under 1 hour 15.

Then in 2016, while major works were taking place on the path, the event was re-branded as ‘Henley to Henley’, again an out-and-back but this time I did the full 30km distance as part of my training for the Adelaide Marathon. Those who ran it or volunteered at it will remember the atrocious weather conditions!

I had always wanted to do the ‘proper’ Hills to Henley but each year there was some kind of diversion from the ‘proper’ course. (Even this year there was a slight diversion near the end – one of these days they will finish the works on that path!)

Last year I had intended to run it, I didn’t end up doing it for various reasons, and in any case it was quite a changed course, finishing at a different location, so even if I HAD done it, I would have felt obliged to do it again! (On that day I did a 35km run by myself and ended up running my fastest ever 30k as part of that, so I probably should have entered!)

This year, probably about a month out, I saw it come up on my news feed, and as I am currently training for a marathon and totally NOT enjoying the long solo runs, I figured it was a good way to get my long run in with some company!

(The timing of the event, 4 weeks out from the Adelaide Marathon, means it sits perfectly in a marathon training programme. I expect that the majority of people who do this event are using it as part of a training programme.)

I had a relatively easy week leading up to the event, I didn’t do my usual caffeine detox, mainly because I forgot until Friday. I had a few things on that meant I didn’t do as many gym sessions as usual. I did get my regular monthly massage on the Thursday before, which was a total coincidence as I had made the appointment even before I’d decided to do the event!

I broke one cardinal rule of Run Club – don’t ever wear new gear on the day! I had bought a new pair of running shorts, and I hadn’t had time to test them out on a run prior to the event (in fact I took the tags off as I was getting ready on the day!). I had, however, done a couple of long runs in a pair of the same shorts, which I’d bought second hand and really liked except that I wasn’t super happy with the way they fit, so I’d gone with a slightly different size. What I did like about them was the plethora of pockets – very useful for long runs!

Those who know me will know I typically don’t put too much effort into my appearance, but when it comes to races I do consider what the photos are going to look like. My long run fuel of choice is small protein balls, and I needed to find a way to carry them that didn’t look like I had a bunch of hernias in the photos! These shorts thankfully have a couple of waistband pockets on the back, so I was able to stash the balls in there. From behind it probably didn’t look great but at least they wouldn’t be visible in the photos!

I had pizza for dinner the night before, I tactically ordered a 15” pizza so I’d have leftovers on Sunday night!

On the morning I had to drive to West Beach for a bus at 6:20am. Given the 8am start time, and not wanting my breakfast to be more than 2 hours before the race, I took my breakfast smoothie to drink on the road.

The bus got us to the start line at 6:55am, just over an hour before the start, which seemed to be a long time to wait but actually was not that bad. On the bus I sat next to a girl called Emma who was hoping for sub 3 hours (I later looked up the results and she ran 2:41 so I assume she would be pretty pleased with that!)

As soon as we got off the bus I got a sense of déjà vu – I had been here before. Not for a running event, but I once played soccer here against NAB (not the bank!). I can’t remember the details of the game but I’m pretty sure it was a cup game and they were several divisions above us so I presume we got flogged – hopefully today’s outcome would be better!

It was chilly but ideal running conditions – I started off with a hoodie and trackpants but eventually peeled off the layers – other than the brand new shorts I had on a T-shirt and arm warmers.

 I was very happy to see that we had access to the toilets inside the clubrooms – if nothing else, so that we could get out of the cold for a little while! I did utilise the inside toilets but after not too long most of them ran out of paper so even though there were 5 toilets, only one of them had paper! Note to self – chuck a roll of TP in my drop bag next time! Thanks to the volunteer who went scrounging to find more paper – it was much appreciated!

I didn’t really have a time goal as such, but having run ‘Henley to Henley’ in about 2:35, 8 years ago in pretty bad conditions, I figured I should be able to do sub 2:30 (5 minutes/km pace). As it happened, there was a 2:30 pacer (there were a couple of other pacers too but he was the fastest of them) so I thought maybe I’d try to go with him at least in the beginning and then take it from there!

 I had run the Greenbelt half marathon a few times, the Greenbelt started at Athelstone School and followed a similar course to Hills to Henley, but finishing in the city. But it had been quite a while since I’d last done it, so the start of the Hills to Henley came as a bit of a surprise, with a pretty steep incline right at the start. (The course is net downhill as you can see from the elevation profile, but plenty of undulations along the way!)

 I had a look at my watch at the end of the first kilometre and it was 4:30, which was way too fast, so my response to that was to cover my watch with my sleeve and not look at it again until the end.

 I managed to successfully grab a cup of water at every drink station, get (most of) it into my mouth and probably about 20% of the time I managed to get the cup into the bin! (Cardboard cups make drinking easier, I learned that in my first Gold Coast marathon, as you can fold the cup to make a ‘spout’ so the water can be more easily directed into your mouth).

 I also had a (small) protein ball every 5km – just a few bites. I tend not to take on a lot of nutrition during a race, I rely on having a good breakfast (and pizza the night before DEFINITELY helps!) and then refuelling afterwards. Maybe not the best strategy but it generally works for me! It also saves me dealing with gels, having to time them with when I can get water, and then having to dispose of the empty packets (NOT on the path like I noticed a few people did – grrrr!)

Looking back at the results, my 20km split was just over 1:30, so just over 4:30 pace. I think this was possibly a bit too fast, as I definitely slowed down in the last 10k, and the last 10k terrain-wise is no harder than the first 20. I would actually have expected to go a bit faster in the last 10k as I had a Revvies caffeine hit at the 20k mark. I tried to let it dissolve without it sticking to the roof of my mouth, this was unsuccessful but I think it still did its job.

(Looking at my heart rate graph, it got pretty high towards the end, which makes sense as it definitely felt like I was working a lot harder by then, so I have some work to do to get my pacing and fitness right so I can finish more comfortably!)

 Kind of ironically, my reason for entering this event (other than the sweet bling at the end, and not having to carry any water) was to have people to run with – and I ended up doing most of it on my own, at times not even able to see the runner in front! I was overtaken by a few people (not too many!) especially in the last 10km where I now know I was slowing down a bit, but on the flipside I did manage to pass a few of the half marathon runners, who had started at the same time, just about 9km further down the road.

The small diversion from the Linear Trail came close to the end, probably in the last 5km, and was actually quite welcome, as it was a nice distraction, and a change of scenery, a nice leafy dirt trail!

The last few kilometres was back on familiar territory, the course of the West Beach parkrun – I knew the end was ‘in sight’!

As I ran up the ramp and over the Seaview Road bridge, I could see a 2:15 pacer up ahead – the pacer was for the half marathon, but with both events starting at the same time, the 2:15 would also apply to the 30km distance – even though I was going to be a few minutes behind the pacer, it was still going to be a pretty big PB!

Only one small blip near the end where I was behind 2 girls and they ran off to the side and without thinking, I went to follow them before realising the finish line was over there – luckily it didn’t cost me too much!

I finished in 2:18:31 which I was very happy with! I was expecting to do about 2:30 based on my recent training runs, and my long runs have been slower than at the corresponding time last year, so it’s nice to know I can still pull out a fast one! Also, I needed to be at a function in the city at 11:30 so that was a little bit of motivation to run fast! This meant I didn’t get to hang around at the finish line which was a bit of a shame as it was a lovely day, looked like great vibes, and I knew a lot of people there. I only had time to grab my medal (once again SARRC have stepped up their game with the medals, I’ve been very impressed with the recent ones I’ve received!) and a quick refreshment before heading off.

(Side note and something that I won’t let go unmentioned – it was a pretty good day for me all round as later that day I went to see the Crows vs Hawthorn at the Adelaide Oval and the Hawks had a nice win – probably not the best thing for me to be doing with stiff legs, sitting down for several hours, but of course I’m very glad I went!)

Well done to all the participants in the various distance, and as always a big thanks to all the volunteers and organisers for putting on another great event!

Would recommend!

It’s been a while between drinks – my first race since Victor Harbor in early December last year!

Actually come to think of it that’s not quite true – I did participate in the SARRC Park Stampede Relays in March, a very cool team event with teams of 4 running 5km each – and promptly forgot to write about it! Oh well I’ll just have to do it again next year!

As I was driving to the McLaren Vale Marathon (I was doing the half) it seemed like yesterday that I was stuck in the traffic jam getting to the start of the corresponding event last year! In other ways, it feels like a lifetime ago…

I entered this race when the super early bird pricing came out, I didn’t actually have a definitive plan to run this event again this year (unlike Victor last year where I had unfinished business) but what can I say, I can’t resist a super early bird!

I skipped the Clare Half Marathon this year, an event I’ve run maybe 7 times? Maybe more? This year it was only 2 weeks before McLaren Vale (last year there was a 4 week gap between the two) so I decided 2 good halves in 2 weeks was not realistic.

I’ve been training for it, with my Sunday runs building up from 12k all the way up to 21.1k (starting in late January) and then tapering back to a fast 12k last week, testing out the trusty Nike Vaporflys with the plan to run in them for the half. (I had intended to wear them last year but I bailed because it had been raining leading up to the event and more rain was likely on race day) I checked with the Race Director re the course surface, I seemed to remember it was mostly bitumen and was advised there’s about a 600m gravel section which is out and back (so 1.2km) but the rest is all sealed so I figured it would be all good, although I did put my regular road shoes in the car just in case I changed my mind at the last minute!

So on to my race week preparation. I have previously, prior to races, had a massage on the Thursday before. I’m now on a regular massage schedule and I probably could have planned it better as I had it a week too early to be helpful for this race – but I did manage a good parkrun, only 6 seconds off my all-time PB which has stood for nearly 9 years now, so it wasn’t totally ‘wasted’!

I have been doing speed training on a Tuesday since early this year, but this week I opted to skip this and went for a solo road run instead (because the group I previously ran with on a Tuesday were doing a hilly run and that was a no from me!)

As is now part of my pre-race prep, I had no caffeine after Wednesday morning, with the idea being that when I had the energy drink prior to the race it would hit harder.

A new addition to the race week prep was an RPM (cycling) class on Friday morning to flush out the legs (for previous events I have done nothing on the Friday before the race).

As has been the case for most recent events, I skipped parkrun on Saturday. (By that I mean I didn’t do it, not that I skipped 5km – although that might be fun to try sometime!) I did a Body Balance class in the afternoon to stretch out the legs a bit.

And of course the standard pizza for dinner on Saturday night!

My goal was to beat last year’s time (which I would write in permanent marker on my forearm before leaving home to remind me what I was aiming for, although it had pretty much worn off by the time I washed my hands and applied sunscreen) and if possible sub-1:35, which I had done for my previous two half marathons.

With the half marathon starting at 0730, and remembering the gridlock on the main street last year, I set my alarm for 0515 and left home at 0555 with Google telling me the travel time was 45 minutes meaning I should get there around 0640. Thinking I’d bypass the portaloo madness, I stopped at the public toilet on the edge of McLaren Vale and I was on the main road at 0645. I eventually got to the car park (I think this was the secondary car park – even though I thought I was quite early, the numbers of runners were double last year so clearly the main car park was already full and a lot of people were also parking on the side of the road) around 0700 and made my way to the race village, drinking my energy drink on the way and arriving around 0710 (while making note of where my car was, so I could find it again at the end!)

So with 20 minutes before go time, I had to decide – second toilet stop or warm up? I walked to the end of the toilet queue which was exceptionally long but I did note that there were a LOT of portaloos so I hoped it would move quickly, which it did. I put sunscreen on while in the queue and hoped I’d have time to drop my drop bag off before the start as it would be a funny look, me running along with my Woolies bag! Then when I was almost at the front of the queue the MC announced that the start would be delayed by 10 minutes (as I seem to remember it was last year) which got a cheer from those waiting in the queue – maybe there would be time for a warmup after all!

I only did 1.6km warmup, partly it’s about warming up and partly it’s about making sure my shoes are laced up just right. Being quite a cool morning I think the warmup was definitely needed!

At the start I tried to position myself closeish to the front but not so close as to be dragged along by the fast guys as that would not end well.

As per usual I went out too fast anyway, but I was reminded of a piece of advice I got from Ken, the former leader of my running group, before running the Gold Coast Marathon with the hopes of qualifying for Boston: “Go out hard, and hang on”. On that occasion, it worked!

I saw Beck on the course early on, she was there cheering her daughter Alice who was doing the marathon (and did really well!)  – she said I was in 3^rd place, which I later found out wasn’t actually accurate but it was a great motivator for me not to drop the intensity at any time because a podium is a rare event and I definitely did not want to die wondering! (So even though I probably did not want to hear that at the time, it’s probably one of the factors that strongly influenced my run!)

A few times during the race I got caught behind a ‘Run As One’ group which served as a bit of a pacing bus for me (there were no official pacers in this race). They were going a bit quicker than I would have liked but it meant I could just sit behind them and let them do the work for me for a bit – thanks guys! (They dropped me when we started going uphill, but then I caught up with them a bit later on a flat section). There were a few times when running with them that they slowed down a bit and I felt like I wanted to go ahead but instinctively I decided to stay behind and I think that was a great decision. I think that really illustrates the benefit of having pacers in an event. I mostly don’t use them because I never quite know what pace I’m planning to run!

While running with the group one guy accidentally bumped into me and at the same time another guy tripped over and nearly fell, and very impressively managed to save himself!

After a few kilometres running, comfortably under the 4:36 pace that would get me a course PB, and I didn’t feel like I was exerting myself too much, I switched my Garmin to the HR/lap pace screen so I couldn’t see my overall pace. Hence I don’t know exactly what my different splits were.

I did notice that I got to 14km just under the hour – had I been able to hold on to that pace I could have been close to 1.30 which I never thought I’d do, let alone here!

From 18k, where I knew that barring absolute disaster I would get a course PB, I went back to the main screen on my Garmin. By the last km I worked out that I could run 5:00 and still beat my all time PB – which I had not imagined in my wildest dreams! Given that my slowest km split was 4:38 that should be a no-brainer, so I went back to the HR screen again and pushed hard to the end.

My official (net) time was 1:31:51 which was 5 and a half minutes better than last year – did I mention it seems like a lifetime ago? And my overall (gun) time was also (just) under 1:32. It was about 40 seconds quicker than my all time PB set at City-Bay last year.

Of course I had to get that time engraved on my medal so i went and joined the queue, running into a whole lot of people I knew along the way, then got to the front only to be told I had to pay at the merch stand which was ALL THE WAY OVER THERE (it wasn’t actually that far but I’d just run faster than I’d ever run and my legs were starting to cramp a bit so it seemed a lot further than it was! (My legs had never cramped before from running, but fortunately it was only after the race was over).

Eventually I got my medal engraved, then went to get a free finish line massage. The massage therapist asked if I was planning on doing any of the other GSR events, to which I replied that I hadn’t planned to as I felt like I’d run as fast as I could at Victor Harbor last year so I wouldn’t go back again and then I thought, I ran faster here at McLaren Vale and Victor is flatter and faster so… maybe!

My legs didn’t cramp again after that so I’m sure that helped a lot!

Then I went and queued again, this time for donuts, I bought 3, thinking that some of my friends may like one, none of them wanted one so that was my post-run recovery meal. 3 donuts (and an apple).

Finally, being at a winery it would be rude not to have some wine, right? As I walked to the cellar door I saw Cecile (who was there cheering on Alicia who had done her first half) on her way to get wine. So the rest of the morning I sat on the grass with them and had a sneaky glass of pinot gris.

Was such a lovely day it was a shame to have to leave but I had ANZAC biscuits to bake and the others were leaving too, so I somehow managed to remember where the car was and hit the road.

The weather was glorious, the atmosphere was fabulous and of course the fact I ran a PB made it a great day for me! As always I’d like to thank all the volunteers and organisers for making it yet another GREAT Southern Runs event!

(I did sleep with my medal on and wore it to work on Monday, under my vest. If the time wasn’t engraved on the back, I would have sworn it was a dream!)

So in the past year (McLaren Vale was slightly later last year) I have improved my half marathon PB by 7 minutes. (Would be nice if I can take another 7 minutes off in the next 12 months but I think that’s probably asking a bit much!)

What’s changed?

As previously mentioned, I started doing speed training once a week. I have done it regularly in the past, but not for quite a few years. This year I want to break my 5k PB so I decided weekly speed training was the way to go. I haven’t broken my 5k PB yet but it turns out it also helps with half marathon speed! I’ve done quite a few of the sessions on my own, which I never would have done in the past, but it’s actually not terrible, especially when you can programme the whole session into your watch and just press ‘start’ and it tells you what to do!

Also previously mentioned, instead of just getting a massage a few days before an event, I have started getting one once a month, and I have no doubt this has helped a lot too. I’ve always said I get my car serviced regularly, and see the dentist twice a year, so I should get my muscles serviced regularly too!

Finally, on top of running less (which I’ve been doing for the past 2 years, running 4 times a week instead of 5, so that’s not exactly new), I’ve been doing more cross training in the gym, and added some heavier lifting into my programme with the guidance of my physio.

Stay tuned for the next ‘exciting’ instalment!