Foxes, ducks, sleep and other stuff

It's been a week or so since I checked in. And WHAT a week. My lord. Best description of the last seven days is that I put my head down, and someone whacked me around the head with a wet mullet.

Not really sure where to start..

Have you ever heard people talk about the need to rest well in order to train hard? Well I can officially vouch for that. Picture this. Friday night ...after the a monster, mullet-slapping week. It's around midnight, house full of people... all on the couch (world's most comfortable couch, by the way). One minute I'm looking at a frock on line. The next, I wake up, and the house is empty, save Jessie D and AmyAnna. What the heck? I apparently crashed and burned...the emphasis on crash. So I sleep. Lots.

On Saturday, I wake up with a sore throat. Achy. I have a massage, intending to go for my 90 minute run around 5. I put my head down at 1.30pm. I wake up at 5.30pm. Feel like a stoned porcupine .... I go to bed at 8pm. Yes, 8pm. Sleep through to 6.30am Sunday. Wake feeling like a new woman. Like Barbie, fresh outta the factory.

I've said it before and I'll say it again. Sleep is often the only weapon against feeling-like-crap-itis.

Along comes Monday. This 90 minute run is haunting me. I know i have to do it, because if I skip it, I can kiss goodbye to Darlington.

I wake at 5am on Monday and head out from my place.

It is a GORGEOUS morning for a run. A touch humid, but still as bro...

I run around Herdsman and it's just incredible. The sun coming up over the city, and across the water. About 40 mins into the run, I'm in the bowels of the reserve, kinda deep into the wetland area and there he is. A fox!! Fantastic, Mr Fox I presume..

A russet red, beady eyed, bushy tailed fox. He stops in the middle of the path, about 10 metres away from me. We stare each other down (kind a feels like Home and Away, right?)

All the ducks and swans are going bananas ....Channelling my inner 4 year old, I rip my earphones out and screech..."RUN AWAY DUCK, FOR GOD's SAKE ...RUN AWAY...!"

As Lozzie often says, I'm not that good in a crisis. And seeing a fox maul a duck / swan / water bird would have definitely counted as a crisis. But! My insane screaming scared the stuffing out of Mr Fantastic and he jumped into the stream, ignoring the floating buffet in front of him and race out onto the embankment.

By now all the birds (me included) were still screaming and the next thing I know, Fantastic gave me one last glare, before ducking away into the reeds. I know he was a man, because Fantastic couldn't stand the sound of ladies yelling at the tops of their lungs.

The rest of the run was boring by comparison. and it hurt. I'm now more afraid of Darlington than ever before because I know how hard it is. i remember. And this run was flat.

I'll spare you the violins because while I was running I did think about GP, who is not well. He is doing quite badly actually so I kept on shuffling, really thankful that I can shuffle.

So there you go. Let that be a lesson for all of us. Get enough sleep. Yell at a fox and he will run away, regardless of how fantastic he is. When you're doing it tough and wanting to quit, there is always someone, somewhere who wishes they were in our (running) shoes.

Chat soon

GT

Love Life. Love it NOW!

So by now most of you would have heard me talk a bit about my friends GP and BS - both staring cancer in the face right now. By way of an update, GP is right in the thick of his fourth course of Chemo. It's s**t. We wait until there are more tests. Then we wait some more. It's cruel and it's heartbreaking. BS is doing better. All reports are positive.

So without being morose and melodramatic, because neither of these two people are, it HAS changed my perspective. I don't get as cranky about the dogs scratching my floorboards. I am a lot more thankful for small things. I don't care as much about what people may or may not think of me.

Which leads me to today. I ducked into Leederville this morning to have a quick breakfast at Cranked, and there she was. My 5 year old neice, out having breaky with her Dad..my big brother.

Get one thing straight. I ADORE this child. I love her beyond words. We have the best time together. So we have a good old chat and then she asks me if we can do our normal thing, which is where we lie down on the grass together outside of Cranked and take a photo on my blackberry. It's kind of how we roll. Now this usually happens after work on a weekend. Not first thing during peak hour when I'm all frocked up.

Ahh what the hell. I kicked off my shoes, hitched up my frock and lay down on the lawn with my niece. Strange looks? Who cares. Life is precious and so is she. Long after she's too cool to hang out with me on the lawn in my work frock, I will cherish this and so many other moments like it.

So that's how the day started. And it finished with a quick 7km around Lake Monger. I ended up a sweaty, happy mess after shaving 1 minute and a half off my 7km time.

It was also super fun because I drafted off my client (without know it was him) for half of that time...

Running around the lake is great fun because, if you actually take the time to notice, there is SO much going on. Like the bunch of school boys doing pre-season, TEARING around that lake as if there were free beer waiting for them at the end. Oh. Hang on...

Like ducks. Have you EVER noticed how ... functional they are? If I didn't believe in God as a creator, I would swear they were made at Ikea. I mean, all their bits just fold away neatly. Ingenious.

Like the bloke walking his two Great Danes. Man, those things were bigger than the first Shetland pony I ever rode.

Like the the really fast people who LOPE past me without so much as a puff, making me consider (albeit momentarily) how i can trip them up without getting caught.

So much to notice. So much to be thankful for and so much to love about life.

Chat soon.

GT

Things I love and hate about running.

Here's my list - feel free to add yours.

Things I Love

Wicked endorphins

Helps me clear my head and gives me space to think

De-stresses me

Gets me fit and strong

Gives me perspective

Shows me what my body can do

Increases my capacity at work

Easy to do, even when I'm traveling

Seeing lots of other, happy runners out on the track.

Things I Hate

Chafing from my bra and my heart rate monitor

Arguing with myself when the run gets hard

The easterly and the sea breeze, respectively

Shows me what my body can do

Wearing the wrong socks and getting a shocker of a blister

Getting a salt encrusted face.

When fast people run past me and they're not even puffed

My Body is a mystery to me...

I am making a serious effort to get to know my body. For the past 30 odd years, I've done my best to ignore it. I mean, I have a degree in politics and journalism - what do I need to understand my body for? Its better for everyone if I just continue to ignore it unless it gives me reason to do otherwise, like Gastro. Yep. That's a good reason to notice my body...

This morning - classic case in point. 5.30am and I'm strapping on my heart rate monitor. My resting heart rate is a little high. Not a good sign. My client and friend, JN, is an experienced athlete. To put you in the picture, he celebrated his 50th birthday by doing a FULL iron man distance triathlon, and backed it up 10 days later by running the New York Marathon. He knows a thing or two about training. He told me once that the legend that is Robert De Castella did a lot of his training load based on what his resting heart rate was when he woke in the morning. High heart rate meant his body was recovering still, or fighting something off. Normal heart rate meant go hard.

True? No idea but I have found that in my world, it can be true.

This morning, my body punished me for 7kms. It hurt. I found it hard to find my pace and my heart rate was through the roof for the whole run. Though I shaved another minute off my 7km time, it was neither pretty nor fun.

But here's the thing....I ALSO woke up this morning feeling like I couldn't breathe very well, with a bit of a sore throat. I THOUGHT about staying home decided against it. My body flipped me the bird while I ran around Lake Monger. It yelled abuse in my ear.

Thus begins the dawning of a new day. I'm going to listen to my body a bit more and see where it gets me...even though I may have to occasionally tell it to mind the language.

Chat soon

GT

Hello GT , remember me? I'm Reabold Hill...

When we were in Maui last year, Langer and I drove to the summit of the Haleakala Crater. I remember it so well for so many reasons. Primarily because of the altitude sickness. It knocked me for six. One minute I was cruising along in the rental Jeep-of-Glory, then next I was passed out with a monster headache...

Secondly, because it felt like we would drive in the clouds and the rain forever, but then, when we least expected it, we burst through the clouds and there we were...10 thousand feet above sea level, right on top of the world. It literally took my breath away.

Haleakala means "House of the Sun" ...check out these pics and you'll see why..

I thought about that trip this morning when I was out running.
It was my first hill session in about a year. I knew it would hurt and it did. It hurt. Did I mention that i really hurt...?
Before you get all funny on me, I'm not about to draw a metaphor about ascending the Haleakala Crater and running Reabold hill.
That would be a totally bollocks analogy.
No, I just remembered the trip while I was running and wanted to share it because it was one of the most amazing things I've ever had the pleasure of seeing.
So back to this morning. Reabold hill is NOT a volcano. It is Not 10 thousand feet above sea level. At 93 metres high, it's the tallest peak on the Swan Coastal Plain. The track I run there is the old road that used to be single lane but both ways.
Anyone who grew up around that area like I did, will know it well. Now, the road is a running, walking and cycle track. It's 800ms to the top and it's steep as bro..
This morning I knocked of circuits ascents. It hurt but it felt good. And when i got to the top, I could see the whole city. Such a beautiful morning as the sun came up, and rather than being a hot, stuffy morning, the air was clean and crisp. In a word stunning.
And even though it hurt like a poke in the eye with a blunt twig, it was one of those mornings that made me so glad to be a runner.

Have an amazing week.

Chat soon
GT

I met this man while running

I would best describe this morning's run as a one hour poo-shower. My first 6o minuter in ..well ages actually. But it is now done and I even managed a negative split (-3 mins over the back half hour..pretty happy with that given how hard it found it)

But that's not why I'm writing today.

You see, I met this guy on the last 1 km of my 9kms. It's NOT what you think!

So I was struggling through my last 2 kms or so ...just before the start of the last incline.., the one that starts just before Karrinyup road and heads down into Trigg beach..you know the one?

I chucked a quick glance over my shoulder to see if there were any bikes coming and instead I see this PUNK drafting on my tail. So I stepped on the gas baybeh, thinking that I would toast his badass and leave him in my wake.

Err...no. He accelerated and ran next to me. A quick peak sideways and he's a bloke in his 50s..grizzled, grey even - a beard, running VERY comfortably. I suspect he was either a super human or on the start of his run rather than on the end of it.

We ran together for a while. I was annoyed because I had to adjust my pace to keep up. I was listening to Mutemath (Electrify, for fellow fans..) and I had hoped they were enough to help me keep up with this guy. Who WAS he?

Then a strange thing happened. After a couple of minutes, I stopped caring and started enjoying the company of my anonymous pace-setter. A couple of times I feared he'd take off and leave me so I ripped an ear phone out and spluttered "See that black ute up ahead? That's me - can you stay with me till then?"

He smiled and nodded. He did stay with me, and when I slowed to a stop, he waved and wished me good luck .

What a champion! I can say categorically that everyone I have ever met through running has been the same. So encouraging, so happy to help, so keen to give you a leg up along the journey.

Even at my first half marathon at Darlington, where I finished 3rd last, a similar thing happened. A stranger ran with me for 25 mins or so, encouraging me, geeing me along and telling me to hang in there. Even the marshals on the road shouted encouragement at my right down to my dying moment.

I know I'm not a competitive runner and if I were things may be different, but that's not why I do it. I do it to keep fit and to keep sane. The generosity of spirit I have encountered is an added bonus and a fantastic inspiration.

Happy weekend folks...oh and happy 21st to Jessie D - gtmedia's fabulous intern. I promise to wear my highest heels tonight Jess, that is, if I can walk...

Chat soon

GT

My brain is powerful so I should use it...

Tonight I was listening to this guy called Dave Gilpin talk about a whole bunch of stuff. It was so good. But one of the things which really grabbed me was a statement he made: "Attitude is 90% of life."

I love that. I LOVE it.

We've all heard it right? The whole, mind over matter thing..? How many stories have we heard from champions in life and in sport about the mental edge. I know a lady called Barbara Oldfield. She was, in her heyday, number 2 in the world in Squash. Squash is not a game I have a lot of affection for. It's bloody hard and I always used to get smashed by those hard black rubber balls. But I digress...

Barbara is an amazing woman. She told me once that she reckons she won 80% of her games in the dressing room before she even got on the court. She would simply psyche her opponents out.

She would unleash the formidable power of her mind and the majority of her opponents would surrender before they ever got onto the court.

Attitude is 90% of life.

I remember a time when I was afraid of running. I remember a time when I would look at Lake Monger and think I would never be able to run the entire 3.5km around it without stopping. It just seemed too big and too scary and I was too unfit. And I remember as if it were yesterday, the day I woke up and thought, I'm going to try and I actually think I can. It took me nearly half an hour to shuffle around the 3.5 kms - a distance that now takes me around 18 mins...barely a warm up.

Attitude is 90% of life.

My running coach, Budgie, is a wise man. When he wrote my first ever program he told me not to look beyond the week I was working to. Now that's just silly. I am the kind of person who reads the last page of a book first. Yes I do. Don't you judge me...

So of COURSE I looked ahead to weeks 10 and 11...I saw 90 minute runs. I saw 6k interval sessions. I broke into a sweat at the thought of it. Budgie told me that my perspective would change....and it did. Now, I think of anything under 40 minutes as a short run. Now, I look forward to my long 90 minute sessions. It's a chance to clear my head and blow away the cobwebs. Oh and I think I may have developed a serious addiction to the endorphins...

So attitude is 90% of life. Because I have done two half marathons, I KNOW I can do a third...and a fourth and a fifth. It's a no brainer. My perspective has shifted. What was Mount Everest is now just a warm up jog.

Cool, huh?

Chat soon,

GT