.......................from the 22nd floor.My aim for each of this year's runs is to try to better the times for the same events of 2008....so far it's working!
I spent 6 days at the Gold Coast, staying at Main Beach, "Pacific Views" on the 22nd floor & right across the road from the beach! I didn't have far to go for a daily surf & found I hadn't forgotten how to swim since the years of swimming at Bronte & Clovelly beaches in Sydney.
I repeated the lead up to this half marathon exactly as I'd done for the SMH Half back in May : 2 days taper but with the wonderful ocean to surf in this time!
An early 6:20 a.m. start Sunday morning was cool & pitch dark making my way across to the where the races began at Southport and meant getting up at 4:30a.m....not my time of day at all, but good for this particular climate change. This year, I didn't lock myself in or have to break down doors & smash locks as I did last year! In fact, everything, including the half marathon, couldn't have gone better!
My time on this course last year was 2:27:02. On Sunday I ran 2:21:06! This gave me (at 79) 1st place in my age category (75-79); 2nd place was a Japanese runner who was somewhere around half an hour behind me!! Lucky I didn't know she was there until I saw the results in the paper next morning!
I felt great throughout the entire run; never uncomfortable & didn't need to stop at two of the drink stations; I just kept on flying past everything & everyone I could overtake! I think I can run faster than I did & will practise a 6:30 per km pace in training runs of 12-14km in the weeks ahead of any future half marathons....Bankstown probably being the next one.
Thank you to all who have left encouraging comments on my blog; you keep me motivated to keep running on into my 80th year which begins this September!
Good job beating the Japanese woman. You know they are pretty tough and tend to live forever!
ReplyDeleteSounds like a perfect holiday.
Well done LL on another age group win. You gave them 4 years and still they couldn't beat you. At least Ewen didn't have to call the fireys with an axe this year.
ReplyDeletegreat work Lucky Legs...my friend who is some 37 years younger than you would love to run that time in her first half at Disneyland in early September!
ReplyDeleteYour blog is becoming repetitive. You're so boringly good!
ReplyDeleteWell done! It was great to see you looking so well afterwards.
ReplyDeleteSorry we missed you on the weekend. You are like a good red Chickybabe. You just keep getting better with age. You will be running sub 2 hours when you turn 85.
ReplyDeleteI knew that SMH was no fluke. Looks like you're going to have to add a week's holiday in before every race from now on :-)
ReplyDeleteGnome
Was hoping to run into you again LuckyLegs (last time was years ago on the raod in Mittagong) - sorry to have missed you. Great to see you going so well. What's next?
ReplyDeleteA big congrats! Well done on the run, the time & of course not getting locked in anywhere!
ReplyDelete:)