A Barry Crocker

2min/1min/2min with 30JR then 30SR x 2, 4mins. 3K WU, 3K WD

Didn't come up this morning with Sunday's run perhaps taking more out of me than I thought it would. I was also exhausted on Monday night and could have done with 9hrs+ sleep instead of the 7.5 I got. Waking up hungry didn't help.

Nevertheless, I plugged away running some distance behind Jonesy at the back of the A-Team. It wasn't until the warm down run that I started to feel ok and then I rolled along nicely.

The body feels ok so I'm not too worried. Its been quite a while since I had a disappointing session and I was probably due for one.

Sudnay - Great weekend at Noosa!

Fri - 50 mins, 10k's @ 5:00mins/km
Sun - Noosa Tri 10k run leg 40:06, 3k WU, 5k WD

MJ and I had a fabulous weekend at Noosa!! Ran around like a headless chook on Friday morning getting the pool man to install a new filter (@ $725 - ouch!!), doing my Friday recovery run around the back streets of Wavell Heights and getting swooped by a magpie and getting a rub from Bruno. So it was a relief to jump in the car and head up the coast at 1pm, only just beating all the traffic heading up the Coast. \
We arrived at Noosaville's Islander Resort in good time and spent the arvo relaxing before getting a gourmet pizza for dinner washed down with a bottle of red. Saturday morning saw us enjoying a gourmet breakfast at Berardo's on the beach with my Northies team mate RooBoy and his girlfriend Tanya. Then it was off to the Expo to get registered and it was there that I bumped into Lee Troop registering for the Bolt and I had a chat with him for about five minutes about his thoughts on the race - a nice bloke. After an afternoon of chilling out, MJ and I headed back to Noosa Parade for the Bolt. But firstly, there was the small matter of watching the Cox Plate and the Noosa Heads SLSC and I had former Carlton great, Stephen Kernahan watching the race next to me. I managed to refrain from mentioning the 1986 Grand Final (I was a Hawthorn fan at the time) Just like last year it was great fun to get out on the road with all the Bolt runners and have a quick chat with them pre-race and fire them up. It was a pretty inspiring race with Marty Dent and Eloise Wellings getting the spoils and from a personal perspective, I realized that I've got a lot of work to do before I can run in the Bolt without embarrassing myself! The last place male ran 17:30 and was overtaken by Wellings who gave him a one minute start as the women's race started shortly after the men's. The day wound down with MJ and I enjoying a Thai dinner, two XXXX Golds and a relaxing DVD.

Triathlon day saw me getting numbered at 6:30am with my new team mates. They were actually Chelle's team before she passed the run leg baton to MJ who passed it on to me!! I then headed to Noosa Beach where I found a quite table at the back of the dunes and spend most of the next two hours writing my Intraining Women's Classic Repot, Simon Doyle 1500m Classic report and the start of my Noosa Bolt report. Finally it was time to head to the PCRG tent and drop my gear off before heading out to for a 3k warm up prior to entering transition just before our cyclist to arrive after 60-65mins on the bike. Note to all triathlon team runners - NEVER trust a cyclists time prediction as they are more often than not grossly optimistic!! After 78 minutes (and 20 minutes of waiting for me!) our cyclist finished his ride and I headed off feeling good and energetic with three GU's fuelling me. I was running very comfortably and a cool breeze meant that the warm weather wasn't an issue for me. Despite a plan to cruise around in 42 minutes, I reached 5k in 20:06 after missing the 3 and 4k markers. Still feeling comfortable I then cruised home steadily with a slight negative split. It was fun to overtake a zillion people including plenty of other team runners and I would have yelled 'Coming through' close to 100 times as I weaved and bumped my way through the traffic. I pulled up nicely and was breathing normally barely thirty seconds later.

A great weekend ended when we headed straight back home and I faced the sobering reality of having to type up 2 R4YL reports and then do a shift at work ending at 11pm.

Matty reporting from Noosa!!!

Thurs - 3kWU, 4k tempo 16:06, 3k WD
Fri - 50 mins - 10k's

MJ and I arrived at Noosa at 3pm this arvo and checked into the Islander Resort opposite from the Noosa River. The accomodation is nice and comes courtesy of the good people at USM Events who have shouted me the trip so I can come up and cover the Noosa Bolt for R4YL.

Its been a very frantic yet fulfilling time for me over the last 48 hours and I'm looking forward to chilling out next to the pool and reading a good book(you know the one I'm talking about, Lacho!!) I will be replacing MJ in a team for the Noosa Tri and will just do a solid tempo run - maybe around 41-42 mins for the 10k run leg. Coming so soon after a hard 5k last Sunday and a fast speedwork session, I'm not going to flog myself considering I may have pushed it a little bit too hard at speedwork on Tuesday. I didn't think much about it at the time, but late on Tuesday or Wednesday(I can't remember when!) I had a funny feeling in my left calf muscle - it felt like someone had pumped it full of air. The feeling went away after a few hours and I had no probs with my next run. I then forgot about it until I mentioned the incident in passing to Bruno whilst getting a rub this morning. Bruno then felt around and found a tight nerve behind my left knee and at the top of the calf muscle. Gees, it was possibly the most painful minute I've spent with Bruno and believe me there's been some. Bruno is pretty certain the tight nerve was caused by the back to back hard runs on Sunday and Tuesday and that my body, whilst in good shape overall, is not quite ready for hard speedwork twice a week. As such, I will be discussing with Pat about incorporating a tempo run of maybe 8-10k's into my program on Thursday's over the summer and hopefully my body will be right for twice a week speedwork by the time Pat kicks off our 'Countdown to Gold Coast'.

That's it for now - looking forward to the weekend!!!

16k's of midweek boredom

80 mins - 16k's @ 5:00-5:10 mins/km

Trundled along on the tready for a mindnumbing 80 mins with the assistance of a GU and the Bullets game replay on Fox Sports.

Going hard.....

15 min Fartlek, 3k WU, 3k WD

Felt good and ready for a solid session this morning, helped by taking a GU when I arrived at South Bank. We went to the Edward St corner of the Botanic Gardens and instead of running our usual 'square', Pat marked out a triangular course covering a longer stretch of grass than is normally the case. I've taken it pretty easy on the grass in the last two years due to the shin splints and concerns over the stability of my ankles but I thought today was as good as any other to push it a little harder on the grass and see how we go whilst doing 30sec fast, 30sec jog fartlek

I scooted away to a quick start and opened up a 10m break on a chase pack. It was nice to be feeling strong and leading a session again and I maintained the lead till the six minute mark when James (17:25 5k at BRRC on Sunday) and then Gaz went past me. Later Mark T passed me and Andy, Jonesy and Mike R joined me to form a pack chasing Mark T. As twelve minutes ticked over, Mark began to come back towards the chase pack and this was the moment for me to tap into my reserves, drop the pack and overtake Mark to reclaim third. With Pat yelling for us to sprint the entire last lap, the competitive instincts kicked in and I selected my top gear and rocketed to the line well clear of my challengers. A satisfying session.

Kms this week - 10
Kms this month - 201
Kms this year - 1518
Core Strength this week - 39 min
Core strength since 16/10 - 1hr

Sunday - BRRC 5k Champs

BRRC 5k Champs - 9th in 17:56 - 3:34, 3:34, 3:41, 3:39, 3:28 - 2k WU, 8k WD

I had a shocking prep for this race with MJ and I attending a BBQ on Saturday arvo. I only had three beers but ended up grazing on food throughout the arvo instead of eating a substantial meal. That probably contributed to me waking up at 4:30am absolutely starving. Like an alcoholic signalling for the bartender, I knew I was doing the wrong thing as I wolved down a very large helping of porridge to go with the 600mls of water I had gulped upon awakening. But as I have significantly reduced milk intake until after I get tested by an immunoligist/allergist, there aren't many other cereal options. So it was not surprising that I was feeling nauseous as I eased gingerly through a warm up run. With 15 minutes to the gun, there was no choice but to duck into the bushes for a self assisted hurl - no, I'm not anorexic!!! I took a GU straight after the hurl to top up the energy levels and finished the warm up, snorting stray oats from my nose!!

After stretching and strides, I arrived at the start line with an A goal of a sub 17:45 PB and a B goal of sub 18:00. There was a good sized field at the starting line but I was surprised to settle into the race in the top ten. I ran a controlled first k tracking City to Surf runner up, Clare Geraghty as I knew she was in 17:30 shape and would run close to a 3:30 split to open proceedings. I maintained my momentum with a 3:34 second k, but like many others before me, watched as CG pulled away from me. Rejoining Riverside Drive past the Boatshed, I hit a bad patch and felt like I was only plugging along. Had to stave off negative thoughts at this point with the weak side of my brain arguing 'You had a poor prep and vomited before the race - a low 18 min race is still a fair effort.' Going though 3k in 10:49(only 22 secs of my recent 10:27 3KTT) I made a pact with myself to attack the incline next to the milk factory and proceeded to run strongly up this incline and through to Montague Rd. Ahead of me, Clare G had just overtaken a reasonably quick 10k race runner on his second lap and I set myself the challenge of reeling him also, which I did just before we turned off Montague Rd, having clocked a 3:39 effort to stem some of the bleeding from the 3rd k. I was feeling better at this point and although starting to hurt, I knew that with a downhill stretch to come, sub 18 was mine and so it proved as I kicked home in 3:28, passing an encouraging MJ 200m from the finish to stop the clock in 17:56.

I was sucking in the big ones at this point and deeply regretting that I had agreed over a few drinks at the Bullets last Sunday to go back and run Clairie in. Sure enough, only two minutes later, Clairie came surging towards the finish line. I managed to run with her for maybe 10 metres, but was too stuffed to go any further and had to settle for yelling at her rather loudly :) I picked up a gold medal for winning the 30-34 age group category and it'll be interesting to see how I can go in that category next year, but in the long run, I'm more interested in trying to win BRRC races and the Championship outright. Given the poor prep, the pre race dramas, the fact that I'm holding myself back to 3:30 pace at speedwork and the fact that I'm still a little short of full weekly mileage of 72k's, I'm quite satisfied with my effort.

Tesso announced afterward that her Garmin had recorded the newly measured course at 5.13k's. If correct, the extra 130 metres took me around 24 seconds meaning I would have run a 17:32 PB. It didn't really feel that fast but you just never know sometimes! Put it this way - I wouldn't be disappointed if Tesso was proved corrrect!

The above photos show me in control at the 1.8k mark as go past the start finish area and again at the finish line as I veer left into the finishing chute at top speed. I like the position of my legs well behind my centre of gravity and suggesting that my overstriding problems are well and truly behind me.

The only downside to the day was failing to get some core strength work in leaving me with a miserable 21 minutes for the week and 5hrs and 39 mins to do next week to catch up!

Overcoming difficulties

Wed - 14k's @ 5:00 mins/km
Thurs - 2 x 1k @ 3:37, 3:23 - 4k WU, WD

Its been a difficult couple of days after my dear 91 year old Grandmother had a fall on Tuesday arvo. She was not answering her phone when my Uncle tried to call her so he texted me to go and check on things. After a nervous drive, I arrived at her place to find a message from the Qld Ambulance Service on the front door saying she was fine and had been checked into RBWH. I then went there and checked her out with the doctors advice rining in my ears 'Someone needs to be with her for the next 48 hours'. With Mum on an overseas holiday for a month, both of my brothers on an extended working trip in the UK and all other rellies interstate, yours truly was the man on the spot! Fortunately, Nanna's recovery has been rapid.

I managed to order her to stay in her armchair for two hours yesterday whilst I dashed out to Fitness First for an easy 70 mins on the tready. I followed that up with some solid 1k efforts along the Kedron Brook in very warm conditions at 9am this morning after I had waited for Nanna to get out of bed. It felt good to get the work done given it would have been easy to skip a session or two.

Countdown to Gold Coast Marathon 2007 starts NOW!

15 min fartlek, 2 x Gold Hill, 3k WU, 3k WD

A solid fartlek session this morning and two efforts up Gold Coast Hill to get my day underway. A fair hitout. Moving on to my announcement:

The first Sunday in July might be more than eight months away, but my preparation to crack the three hour barrier starts now! I know plenty of good runners who have just fallen short of that Sub 3 holy grail despite good campaigns and I'm determined not to be one of them. I also know a number of runners who needed at least five marathons under their belt to get from 3:10-3:15 to Sub 3 so the magnitude of my attempt to improve from my 3:12:45 debut Marathon in 2004 to Sub 3 at my second attempt next year can't be underestimated. To be successful, I'm going to have to work bloody hard and leave no stone unturned over the next eight and half months. Probably the key part of my preparation will be to build up my core strength to a level that will withstand the rigours of the Marathon. It hasn't gone unnoticed by me that the likes of Glenda, Peter and Phil K who are in the 2:50-2:59 Marathon range have a stronger core and leaner appearance than most colleagues in the 3:00-3:10 range. So lets see how I'm planning to achieve this goal:

CORE STRENGTH - Starting this week, I will be doing a minimun of three hours of core strength gym work per week. I've been doing an hour to two hours per week for most of my running career, but tend to drop off quickly when I pick up a cold or have a busy week and I don't try to catch up. From now on, if I fall behind one week, I'll catch up the next. I want to stand on the start line at the Coast knowing that I have at least 130 hours of core strength work in me. I will be keeping a log of my core strength hours on my blog and urge my readers to get stuck into me if I drop off the pace - thanks! Most of my core strength work will be done in my home gym aka 'The Steel Factory' with emphasis on the mid section, abs, sides, lats etc. More than likely I will have a monthly session with a PT in the last 4-5 months of my campaign. Pilates will also be included in my core strength work.

MILEAGE - Weekly mileage will be determined by Coach Pat when I get back on a program shortly but I'd imagine I'll average around 70k's a week over the summer before ramping up mileage from around February next year.

SPEEDWORK - At the moment, I'm still holding back and doing 3:30 mins/km pace at speedwork. Will pick up the speed to around 3:25 pace in November and work my way towards 3:20 pace from there. To counter my frequent problems with lack of energy at speedwork, I will start taking GU's beforehand - they work for me. I've been reluctant to utilise this approach previously as it is a 'quick fix' and I've really wanted to get to the bottom of my real problems - but that will have to be solved as I go along.

LONG RUNS - Pending discussions with Coach Pat, I would like to start doing at least one hilly Mt Cootha Sunday long run per month - they definitely toughen you up! Without forcing the issue, I'd like to see my running efficiency, fitness and core strength improve to the point where I roll along at 4:30-4:40 pace for the duration of my Sunday long runs by next May or thereabouts. This would still be at a 'comfortable talking pace' throughout.

RACES - All going well, I'll do the classic Brisbane Half-Doomben 10,000 lead up to the big dance. In the short term, the Kurrawa to Duranbah 25k relay leg is a target and I will try and race about twice a month over 3-5k's this summer.

INJURIES - My body is holding up well as I steadily increase my weekly mileage from 60 to 72k's. The shins only bother me when I contract a cold thus I'll be working hard to avoid contracting colds! My plantar fasciitis problems are almost a distant memory but I still have to vigorously massage them each night and tape them up before a run. The recent VMO niggle in the knee is still a tad sensitive but getting better quickly. Finally I've resigned myself to the fact that my ankles (which are shot from years of basketball) will have to be taped up before each run for the rest of my career. Pretty happy with my condition at the moment - nothing I can't manage.

So there is it - bring on Gold Coast Marathon, 2007!!!

Knee improvement continues

Fri - 50 mins - 10k's @ 5:07 mins/km
Sun - 120 mins - 25k's @ 4:50 mins/km

I knocked off 10k for my Friday morning recovery run with the knee behaving itself for most of the part. I followed that up later in the day with a rub from Bruno with special attention to the VMO muscle.

The real test of my knee's continued improvement, however, was going to be my two hour Sunday long run. I attended a Buck's party on Saturday night, determined to take it easy on the booze. I managed to restrict the damage to about 10 XXXX Golds over a 7 hour period whilst indulging in the usual antics that we blokes get up to on Buck's nights. Not wanting to sacrifice some much needed sleep and not wanting to get sunburnt, I postponed my long run till 3pm on Sunday.

Starting in beautifully warm conditions I hit the Kedron Brook path and the knee felt good from the word go. I ran a 4k out and 4k back route to ensure that I wouldn't be far from my car if the knee played up but I needn't have bothered. I ended up running 25k's for the two hours, rolling along comfortably at 4:50 pace. The knee was sensitive at times, feeling like it was bruised but there were no major dramas as was the case before Bruno went to work on the VMO.

Meet my VMO

Wed - 40 mins, 8k @ 5:00 mins/km
Thurs - 4min/30JR/2min/30SR, repeat, 45SR, 4min, 3kWU, 3K WD

Went a coupla hundred metres down the road on Tuesday night to speak with Bruno about my knee. Luckily for Bruno, I'm not a hypochondriac neighbour knocking on his door every week. Bruno suspects that the VMO muscle on my left knee is smaller and weaker than the one on the right and it wasn't strong enough to withstand the pressure I was putting on it accessing that big step to my new bedroom. Bruno gave it a massage and the muscle felt 'crunchy'. Bruno also recommended some daily self massage for the affected area as well as exercises to strengthen the area.

Bruno's help didn't pay immediate dividends as the knee was quite sensitive on Wednesday morning and I eased my way to 8k instead of 14k. However, I was back in business this morning with a hard speedwork session at Pat's. I wasn't far behind Glenda and was on par with Aza and Mike. The VMO now feels more like a sore or tight muscle rather than a niggle and knowing what the problem was and that it could be managed gave me the mental latitude to run hard.

I also enjoyed one of my funniest moments ever at training this morning. Towards the end of my warm up, I ducked into the toilets at the top of the QUT Amphitheathre hill. As I walked out, I noticed that Pat was walking in and he hadn't seen me. I was quick to give him a fierce 'BOO!" as he came around the corner. I swear I have never seen a more startled expression than the one on Pat's face as he went into an automatic karate self defence stance - no doubt the legacy of years of karate training before he took a running. A classic moment that left me pissing myself laughing for some time. No doubt Pat will be looking for revenge and I could add to my dubious record of being the only Group member ordered by Pat to do pushups halfway through a session!!

7.5k niggle free....

50mins - 10k's @ 4:52 mins/km

As planned, I skipped speedwork for a run along the Kedron Brook this morning. I got to 7.5k's before the left knee niggle started up again, but it wasn't as bad as Sunday and came and went at various times over the last 2.5k.

Will get it looked at if there is no further improvement overnight.

RICE fuelled recovery

Fri - 5 mins - 1k @ 5:00 mins/km
Sun - 60 mins - 12k's @ 4:58 mins/km

The left knee niggle that surfaced during Thursday's run had worsened by the time I hit the treadmill just before lunch on Friday. I could only manage three minutes before the niggle became quite uncomfortable. As it was too late to see a physio or pod, intensive RICE was the only apparent solution for my recovery. I carried this out by crushing ice in a tea towel and wrapping this around my knee for 20-30 mins two to three times per day. This was followed by at least half an hour of elevating my left leg by resting it on a piece of furniture or such. At all other times, I had the knee firmly compressed with a bandage and I spent as much time resting as possible including some enjoyable sleep ins!

The result was that when I finally began my Sunday long run at 3pm, having delayed it till as late as possible for maximum recovery, I enjoyed a trouble free start to the run. I managed 10k's before the niggle resurfaced 3.5k's away from my car. I gently eased through another two k's with the niggle prominent but not as bad as it was on Friday. After 60 mins, I pulled up and walked the remaining 1500m back to my car. Interestingly, the niggle stopped immediately once I slowed to a walk.

I'm pretty confident that my ability to do 10k's without a niggle on the weekend suggests that I'm well on the road to recovery and further RICE can only be beneficial to my cause. I will skip speedwork at Pat's tomorrow however and go on Thursday instead. I've no idea what caused the problem and there are only two possibilities I've considered:

1 - I've recently switched bedrooms at home from upstairs to a large granny flat style bedroom downstairs known in house as 'the Bunker'. There is a single large step of about 30cm that you need to descend to access the Bunker and MJ suggested that more frequent use of this step could have unsettled my knee.
2 - I got a little bit too analytical looking at the photo that I posted below on Tuesday's 3KTT. If you look carefully, my left foot may be fractionally supinated and perhaps I've subconsciously tried to avoid supinating since.

That's all for now - I have to go crush some more ice in a tea towel. I'lll then roll my trouser legs all the way up and sticky tape the tea towel firmly around the knee. And of course I'll get the usual curious stares from my work colleagues!!!

Km's this week - 45
Km's this month - 69
Km's this year - 1383

Thursday - Left knee niggle

50 mins, 10k's @ 4:59 mins/km

Hit the Kedron Brook path at 5:30pm and felt terrible from the word go. Had some tightness in the chest and was breathing a bit harder than normal so decided just to do an easy 10k's and save the two 1k reps for tomorrow. To make matters worse, I picked up a niggle on the inside of the left knee around the 5k mark that remained with me for the duration of the run. I couldn't work out what it was but nevertheless it was not painful or uncomfortable - just really annoying.


Km's this week - 32
Km's this month - 56
Km's this year - 1370

Wednesday - evening run

60 mins, 12k's @ 5:00mins/km

After hard runs on Sunday and Tuesday followed by a late night at the Bullets on Tuesday night, I was tired on Wednesday morning and decided to get some extra sleep. I also figured my legs could use an additional 10 hours recovery time. It proved to be a pretty good choice as I hit the tready at Fitness First at 7pm after work and churned out a steady 60 mins - my longest Wedneday run in two years.

Km's this week - 22
Km's this month - 46
Km's this year - 1360

Tuesday - PCRG - 3KTT

3k's 10:27(3:26, 3:34, 3:26) 3.5kWU, 2.5k WD

On Monday, my glutes, hammies and quads all paid the price for my groundbreaking run on the Powerful Owl trail as well as for Sunday's touch footy game. I awoke on Tuesday morning and my first thoughts were 'The body's too sore - why not get another two hours sleep and then do a light 50 min recovery run?' Then I thought of all the great runners that I hope to emulate and knew that they would not take that course of action so I hopped out of bed and was on my way.

Instead of joining the Group at the Ship Inn, I went straight out on Riverside Drive hoping that a longer warm up than the usual 2.5k for this session would help get the blood flowing in the legs and to a degree it worked. Standing at the waiting for Pat to send us on our way I locked in my plan - I would run 10:28, one second faster than last month to keep my rate of improvement going and I would run a strong second k to allow me to cruise to the line without busting a gut on the last k. And that's exactly how it panned out!! I refrained from bolting early and settled into a nice rhythm trailing Aza. I ensured that the second k was a strong one by passing Aza shortly after the 1500m turnaround and maintained a smooth run all the way to the line. The legs didn't feel so bad after all once I got going and my breathing was excellent. If I had fresh legs, I could have gone Sub 10 had I flogged myself, but I'm not ready to do that until at least December.

It was good to see my fellow Powerful Owl trail runners Pete and Slash both go sub 10!! I think there's a message in there - go run the trail!!!

Its all good!!!

Sunday - Never give a sucker an even break!

120mins - 24k's between 4:20-5:00 mins/km

'Never give a sucker an even break' - what an immortal quote and it was so apt today!!

Sucker Number 1 - Matty

I was up early to meet the large contigent that Jonesy had organised to meet at the Ship Inn at 6am. Nice work Jonesy! The plan was a two hour run out to Mt Cootha and back to the Ship Inn. Believe it or not, I've never run at Mt Cootha, let alone up it as I've been pretty conservative about doing hills the last two years. Its avoiding overstriding on the downhills that worries me, not the uphills, thank you. In excellent conditions we settled into a nice pace along Coro Drive until the 15 minute mark when I bonked due to a lack of energy. I dropped off the pace set by Langy, Aza, Pete, Slash, Jonesy and Bolty and struggled to the 20 min mark hoping that I would come good. Alas it didn't happen so I took the GU that I had with me for emergencies. Ten minutes later, the GU had worked its magic and I started to steadily reel in the boys - by now 200m ahead.

This was another frustrating episode in my problems with having a lack of energy for training. I'm cranky because I thought I had prepared well. On Saturday, I ate a whole home made pizza for lunch, skipped afternoon tea and had a large plate of Thai Red Curry with 200g of rice for dinner at 6pm. At 7pm, I had a large plate of salad and a hard boiled egg followed by a piece of custard danish. An hour later, I had some liquorice allsorts. Go figure! Fortunately, I've never had this problem in a race, perhaps because I carbo load for all races and as such I'm seriously thinking of carbo loading on Monday's and Saturday's prior to my key sessions the next day.

Back to the run - I caught up to the boys at the foot of Mt Cootha and sailed up the bitumen to a park where we pulled over for a quick drinks break. At this point, Langy and Jonesy both turned for home and there was a surprise on the menu for me - a run up something called the Powerful Owl trail to Channel 9. I had not run trails and had minimised my offroad running for the past two years but with the shin problems a fading memory, I figured today was as good as any to test them out. It was probably only going to take a few minutes anyway. The trail was steep but I was feeling strong at this point and smoothly ascended my way up. Shortly, I took a closer look at where we were going and the climb seemed to stretch into infinity!! Two minutes into the merciless climb, I was sucking in the big ones and watching the mountain goat known as Pete sail scamper away from me with Slash and Bolty in close attendance. By the time I crested the rise after about three minutes, the boys had dropped me. Taking care not to overstride on the downhill that followed, I gritted my teeth and tackled the next ascent. After about 10 minutes on the trail, of which about 7 minutes was spent ascending, I arrived at Channel 9, hurting but much wiser for the experience. I'm rarely passed on Gold Coast Hill at speedwork and consider myself a better than average hill runner, but this was definitely a learning experience. I was later to find out that Langy and Jonesy were pissing themselves laughing after they left the group with Langy commenting to Jonesy 'Poor fool Matty doesn't know what he's got himself into!'

Fortunately, I recovered rapidly and now back on the bitumen, I tried to salvage some wounded pride by setting a brisk pace up front as we headed back. I needed to borrow some money from Pete to by an emergency Mars Bar from a servo at the foot of the mountain, but otherwise, I ran a good tempo all the way back to the Ship Inn and finished a satisfied man.

Sucker Number 2 - Melbourne Storm

In hindsight, I'm sure the Storm would have preferred that they not start favourites in the Grand Final. That's a fair weight of expectation when you're up against the mighty Broncos who were undefeated in five trips to the big dance. I was close to going down to Sydney for the game but the logistics got too difficult. I started the arvo with my good mates, Big Fella and RooBoy at my place and then we proceeded to Andy's place along the banks of the Breakfast Creek. We worked up a thirst with a game of touch footy at Allan Border Field and tucked into a BBQ before settling down in front of the tv. After 79 minutes of unbearable tension, the premeirship was ours and as you can imagine, the boys and I were pretty jubilant!


Km's this week - 64
Km's this month - 24
Km's this year - 1338