Positive progress...

40 mins, 8k's at 5:15 mins/km.

A great day with another easy session on the tready and a good rub from Bruno. Bruno and I spent much of the rub brainstorming about those little things I can do that could potentially contribute to alleviating my problems. Like just about everyone, I've spoken too, Bruno is keen on giving the Skins a go. Also, he supported my idea of trying to get around barefoot where possible saying that some of his clients came in for a rub with their soles still blue from warming up or training barefoot on the Nudgee College Athletics track. Growing up as a kid, I only wore footwear when Mum made me wear them to school, church or shopping!!! And I never had any problems. Over the last few years, with wooden floorboards at my place, I've fallen into the trap of wearing Maseurs and pluggers around the house, especially since getting shin splints. So, I'm going back to my roots and going barefoot as often as possible - hopefully that'll strengthen my feet rather than having them pampered with cushioned footwear.

My spirits and motivation have been high since the Noosa Bolt - I'm really fired up to race it one day and give it a red hot go!!

Another tready session in the bank

40 mins, 8k's @ 5:10 mins/km

Another easy paced hitout at fitness first this morning at about 11.3 kms/hr. Little discomfort in the shins and next week I'll be gradually working the tready speed up to 12kms/hr. When I've run discomfort free for a few weeks, I'll slowly ease the tready speed up a little faster than 12kms/hr.

Tuesday night poker was an interesting experience. As far as the Broncos Leagues Club was concerned we were playing for chips, with no money exhanging hands. In actuality, all seven blokes had kicked in $10, with the winner to take all. I was the third man to run out of chips after a run of bad hands depleted my stakes as the big blind bets continued to increase. Prior to that however, I had played good solid poker and was happy with my performance. I might have to enter a poker tournament at the Casino one day!!

Something else I'll have to do one day is run the PWC Cool Night Classic of 5.13k from the QUT amphitheatre over the Goodwill and Story Bridges, finishing under Michael's. I wathced it for the first time with MJ last night and was really surprised with the large corporate turnout that saw around 3000 competitors - perhaps more. It's moment's like those that I get frustrated knowing that I could be running and finishing in the top twenty.

Encouraging signs....

40 mins, 8km's @ 5:10 mins/km

Hit the tready at Fitness First at 8:30 on my way to work this AM. Wore a brand new pair of Brook's Glycerin 4's and I enjoyed a relatively discomfort free session of 4 x 10 mins with one minute walking recoveries. Its now lunchtime, and I'm here at my desk at work eating leftovers from last nights dinner of nachos and the shins have pulled up well so far.

I've read a lot of postitive reports from runners wearing Skins over the last six months or so. (Skins are body moulded compression garments manufactured from the finest Lycra and Meryl Microfibre, scientifically engineered to provide support and muscle alignment to the garment covered area of your body. Skins will definitely change the way that you train and play as well as speed your recovery. You will feel fresher after heavy bouts of exercise and delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS) will be minimised.) Non-runners may have noticed the likes of Steve Waugh and AFL players wearing these at training and for recoveries. After reading Tesso's blog this AM about how the Skins have proved beneficial for her, I've really decided to step up the research into their properties and benefits. I've still got $80 worth of gift vouchers left over from my birthday five months ago, so hopefully the skins might make a late birthday present(goes to show you how much I hate shopping!)

Off to the Broncos Leagues Club tonight to play Texas Hold Em poker for real money for the first time. I'm backing myself to maintain a good poker face and will be leaving the sunglasses at home!!

Fab weekend at Noosa!

40 mins, 8k's @ 5:10 mins/km

Had a fabulous weekend in Noosa for the Triathlon. I left work early on Saturday and MJ and I headed up on the stroke of noon in order to make it to the Sheraton before the roads closed for the events. After checking in, MJ and headed to the Resort gym. After five minutes on the tready, I realised that I had forgotten to tape my ankles, but thought to myself "aaah - lets see how they go". There was a little discomfort whilst on the tready and some discomfort after cooling down, but nothing major. This time, I ran for 10 minute intervals alternating with a one minute work. Didn't come close to falling off the tready this time, but was again dizzy after getting off.

At 5pm MJ and I left the Resort and walked down to the start of the Noosa 5k Bolt, barely 100m away. There, I obtained my media accrediatation and met up with Run For Your Life publisher, Daniel Green for the first time. The media pass was awesome and enabled Greeny and I to venture onto the middle of the road and watch the warm ups and race from the traffic island just a few metres shy of the Start-Finish. Run under lights for the first time, in cool conditions at 6:30pm, the Bolt was a thriller with Marty Dent holding off Olympian Peter Nowill by one second and Sarah Jamieson winning the women's. I was busy taking splits during the race and jotting down shorthand comments of my observations. Greeny and I then proceeded to interview the likes of Mona, Troopy, Westcott and McCann to go with the aforementioned placegetters. It was a great experience getting an insight into the thoughts of the elites and I also managed to thank Mona personally for the 30th Birthday email he sent me! Wrapped up the proceedings having a long chat with Greeny about our ideas for the mag and its future direction.

Then it was back to the Resort for a quick shower before I took MJ to Berardo's for dinner. I've never dined under a Michelin starred chef before, so I thought it would be good to have a new experience. Boy, was the food good!! I ordered an appetiser of Grilled Pork Belly, Roasted Chilli, Peanut Dressing & Fresh Pomelo, before MJ and I both ordered a main of Flinders Island Milk Fed Lamb, Fillet, Leg & Crepinette, Confit Vegetables, Parsley Coulis. This we washed down with a bottle of 2001 Rosemount Estate Show Reserve Cab Sav which had just reached peak maturity. The phrase "this melts in your mouth" is an overused one but I can assure you that it couldn't be more appropriate for the divine meal we had. The restaurant itself was comfortable and relaxed. Naturally, it was pricey, but for a rare treat, you'd be hard pressed to find a better dining experience.

The next morning started early when I dragged myself out of bed at 5am to watch the Kangaroos account for the Poms before MJ and I headed to the Intraining tent to watch the Noosa Tri. There we cheered on our team mates and friends as well as my brother Adam, who's team managed a 70th placing from 853 finishers. Conditions were equally tough as last year with intermittent heavy rain and warm, humid sunshine testing the competitors. Noosa does itself proud on a weekend like this - it was just a great time!!!

Comeback # 8 - Hitting the treadmill

40 mins - 8k's at 5:20 mins/km with 1 min Walking Recoveries

With the shin splint battle about to tick over into the eleventh month, I today entered the Brave New World of treadmill running. MJ and I went down to Fitness First at Lutwyche this morning and hit the treadys together. Believe it or not, this was the first time I've ever been on a treadmill for more than two minutes and it showed as I twice nearly fell off after losing concentration once and making the mistake of looking over my shoulder on another occasion. Apart from that hiccup, everything went smoothly as I eased into my new running surroundings carefully alternating five minutes of running with one minute walking recoveries. A little bit embarrasing, really, but if its good enough for Lee Troop and Susie Power, its good enough for Matty. Pulled up well, apart from having dizziness and vertigo after hopping off the tready.

Whether I continue to attend Fitness First beyond the two week starter package period remains to be seen. Today, they offered me a package with a $45 joining fee, $60 admin fee, and $46 a fortnight. At more than $92 a month, this is well over the $59 a month that MJ has been paying there for a few years. Needless to say, there'll be a lot of negotiating ahead to lower that price as I won't be taking it. I'm considering coming up with my own offer and tabling it to the manager. If anyone has any good suggestions for negotiating lower membership fees with gyms, i'd love to hear from them!!

God, I love cricket.....

Today was my last run free day, before I hit the treadmills tomorrow with a Fitness First "Starter Pack" giving me two weeks membership for $29. We'll see how things go from there.

Today was also the day I renewed my intimate friendship with Mr XXXX after a 31 day stint on the wagon. Shortly after 10am and shortly before Matty Hayden took strike for the first ball of the Australian cricket summer, I enjoyed a long awaited sip of that tasty amber fluid. "Aaaah - life is indeed good." You'll treasure that first sip of red when you hop off the wagon also, Clairie ;-)

I enjoyed a great day at the cricket with Adam and later joined my old mates Dan, Jimmy and .05 at another section of the ground and things got decidedly rowdier when I joined them!! All in all, it was a day at the cricket, the way it is supposed to be enjoyed.

I then sobered up enough by in time for Langy to pick MJ and I up before we went out to the University of Qld for the Simon Doyle 1500m Classic on the track. I'll be filing a race report for R4YL mag on the event, so I was busy clocking splits and interviewing the respective race winners, Youcef Abdi and Emma Rilan. I arranged for Langy and my photographers, Tesso and Clairie, to join me inside the track for the proceedings. We and our team mates in the grandstand all enjoyed the opportunity to witness the elites up close and gees, they were flying tonight. It was a jolting reminder that I'm a long way off ever doing a sub 4:15 1500, let alone a sub 4!! I'll stick to having a crack at a low 15mins for the 5k, thanks!!

Resting up.....

Missed this morning's Pat Carroll Running Group 3kTT. I've decided to let my shins recover as much as they can before I commence comeback #8, on the treadmill, this Friday. I feel that its best that I commence a radically new form of training unecumbered by the niggling shin discomfort that has been bothering me the last two weeks.

I've had better days.....

The shins still aren't behaving themselves, so I again elected not to run today, with the head winning the battle of logic and over ruling my heart's desire to run. I intend to be fairly patient this week and ease into the treadmill running when my shins have come good again.

Not much else went right today, my brother Benno's Mazda 323 which I'm driving whilst he is overseas overheated this afternoon whilst MJ and I were returning from a BBQ. Fortunately, I was able to get it going again after checking the vitals and topping up the cooling system. Relax Benno - everything is under control. And to cap of the day, the Bullets slumped to 4-7 with yet another loss. Yeah, I've had better days.

Enforced rest day

I woke up with discomfort in the shins and after a few hours of intermittent discomfort, I canned today's scheduled 50 min recovery run. It was clearly the right thing to do and evidenced by the massage I received at noon. Bruno was not happy with what he felt and gave me a good bashing and for the first time in a while tattooed his calling card of four suction cup marks on my glutes. Even though I ran well short of my top speed at speedwork on Tuesday and Thursday, I can't have allowed enough recovery time after my two races in 36 hours last week.

Had a long talk with Bruno about my impending experiment of switching to treadmill running and I've decided to start immediately with perhaps one to two runs on the tready next week, before steadily working my way up to more frequent tready running, pending the results.

Bribie Island Triathlon Photo - 2

Here's a shot of me close to a full sprint about ten metres short of the finish line. Check out my left leg. While the shot was not taken from a good angle for a gait analysis, I appear to be overstriding with the left leg which is about to hit the ground too far in front of my body and centre of gravity. It is this overstriding that is the primary cause of my shin splints, hence the need for me to do glute firing exercises and possibly add treadmill running to my regime.

Bribie Island Triathlon Photo

Here's a shot of me readying for a sharp right hand turn heading out of the transition area to commence my run leg for Northies on Sunday.

1k's at Speedwork

5 x 1km, 60 sec Standing Recovery - average 4:13 mins/km for 5 reps

There was still discomfort in my shins today so I stayed well away from my new top speed of 3:50 mins/km in recording efforts of 4:04, 4:08, 4:12, 4:21, 4:21.

500's at Speedwork

9 x 500's - avg 1:59 reps with 30 sec Standing Recoveries

After two races in 36 hours over the weekend, I still had a little delayed onset muscle soreness present when at training this morning - partially because I took short cuts with my stretching after both races for which I've given myself an uppercut. As a result, I ran the session this AM at no faster than 3:50 min/km pace for the first few reps before easing up. There is a little more shin discomfort than normal tonight but no major dramas.

Spent some time talking with Andy this AM at training - he is back from Reserves duty with the RAN in the Middle East and is a regular treadmill user when at sea. Like Bruno two weeks ago, he gave running on a treadmill the thumbs up for my shins. Over the next fortnight, I will seriously consider becoming at least a part time treadmill runner - perhaps a full time one for three to six months....

Bribie Island Triathlon 750/20/5 - Race 1

Team Northies kicked off the new season with a probable 2nd placing in the first Bribie Tri of the season. RooBoy unfortunately had a Barry Crocker. After sitting nicely in 4th half way through his swim leg, his goggles fogged up and he hit the wall when the flus of the last few months took their toll. Cyclist Matt overcame his own recent flus to put in a blistering 31:40 cycle for the 20 and send me out for my run in no better than 4th position, but well behind the leader. Again mindful of my shins, I ran a controlled 18:25 for the 5k's along the Bribie foreshore passing three other team runners along the way. We didn't stay for the presentation but think we finished 2nd and will find out the results in the Courier Mail in the morning. Fortunately, the shins have pulled up fine so far and I was quite pleased with my effort. Part of me wishes that I could have been just a minute behind the leader and ran him down in glorious fashion, but the shins would have likely paid the price. I'm confident however that Northies will take out the series by winning at least two of the next three races.

Full update here on Monday night.

Brisbane Running Group 3K Challenge

3k - 10:51 - 37th, 5k warmup, 2 k warmdown

Coach Pat's concept of a Brisbane Running Group challenge came to fruition tonight with a good turnout of 15o + runners turning up at the Ship Inn for the run out to the starting point at Riverside Drive, West End. With a 5k run leg in the Bribie Tri on Sunday I had to leave some petrol in the tank and not push the shins too hard so they would be able to back up in 36 hours. Also, I was conscious of my new plan to run fewer efforts at faster than 3:50 pace.

Oops, I got a bit carried away amongst the tide of humanity streaming down Riverside Drive as dusk embraced the city - a 3:32 first k was the result! That was followed by a 3:43 as I concentrated hard on a smooth and economical leg turnover whilst avoiding overstriding. I was really surprised that my cardio fitness was so good that I was able to maintain a controlled leg turnover whilst running a 3:34 last k and not losing my stride. Very happy with my fitness there - running an easy 10:51 with plenty of petrol in the tank at the end and after about 10 seconds my heart rate was almost back to normal. My brother Adam ran for the Run Inn after being persuaded by Schulzy to do so. He ran a hard race for 33th place in 10:20ish. Good to see some more speed in the family - but you won't be winning our $50 bet for the fastest 10k time between us, Mate!!

The Regatta runners triumphed taking out the inagurual trophy which surprised me as I thought the Pat Carrollers had the most depth. Never fear, with myself, Tesso, Clairie and Davo hopefully able to run at top speed next time coupled with absentees Jodie, Andy, Eckers and Aaron running for us, I'm confident we'll prevail next time!!

Another discomfort free run

Speedwork - 50 mins, 10 k's @ about 4:40-4:50 mins/km

Enjoyed a team bonding session without the booze with my Northies team mates RooBoy and Matt last night along with their partners Tanya and Jay. MJ was a no show, having to go to Melbourne at short notice. We took our time enjoying the appetisers before tucking into a main of flame grilled chicken prepared by Jay followed by Mars Bar cheesecake - I kid you not. I am now half way through my annual alcohol free month and it was tough to watch the others relax with a few beers! Only 13 days and 21 hours remain until I hop off the wagon at the Gabba for the first test match agaisnt the Windies!!

With the Brisbane Running Group 3K Challenge scheduled for tomorrow night, Pat primed his charges by just having a 50 min easy run down to New Farm Park. This included a stopover in the Botanic Gardens on the way back for some strides on the grass, which I skipped. The shins felt ok throughout the run and I just concentrated on a good stride and enjoyed the shower that we ran through. Once I get past the 3K Challenge on Friday Night and race 1 of the Bribie Tri 5k run leg on Sunday, I have only three triathlon leg to race in the next four months so will be concentrating on staying injury free and building up mileage. I will decide the intensity of my effort for the above races when I come to them but I certainly won't be going any faster than 3:40-3:50 k's on Friday and Sunday.

Now, onto domestic matters, I got my rates bill last night and for the first time, the council compared my water consumption with that of the local area average instead of my previous quarters consumption. I was shocked to find that despite only two people residing at SportsCentre right now, we had twice the quarterly consumption of the local area average. Now that additional consumption is far too much to be due to the extra water we use to top up the pool levels, so its time to fix that toilet leak which I previously assumed was only a minor one. I refuse to get a plumber in to fix it - we men after all are supposed to be capable of doing this ourselves. Right? Now, I've never done this before so I googled the relevant keywords and found a step by step process of Scott Cam fixing a leaking toilet on the Burke's Backyard website. That'll be the first thing I tackle after lunch - wish me luck!

Another day on the road to recovery...and an idea

2 mins, 30 sec JR, 1 min, 30 sec JR, 2 mins, SR, repeat, SR, 4 mins

I enjoyed a solid session at speedwork building on the momentum of Sunday’s relatively discomfort free Long Run. The intervals were done at around 4:00 min/km pace and I barely slowed down for the jogging recoveries. Pat today added a whiteboard to the rear of the A-Frame that advertises our group to passer-by’s at the Ship Inn. The purpose of the whiteboard is to make our goals public and to enable everyone to support their team mates in accomplishing those goals. Whilst most people have entered goals such as the Gold Coast Marathon next year, I entered “Beat Shin Splints”, and really, that’s my main focus.

As an aside, I have the next four days off work and among other things, will be using the time to research the possibility of starting up…….don’t laugh…… a child care business with a mate. Why not, the demand is still out there and many prospective child care operators are too daunted by the red tape and insurance costs to go ahead with it. Feel free to offer some suggestions on this concept. And, rest assured that were this business to go ahead, I will be far away from the hands on action at the coalface each day!!!

Running in the rain!

Sunday Long Run, 70 mins - 14k's @ 4:52 mins/km

After a great night cheering on the Bullets come from behind win over the Crocs, I headed out to the Criterium at 7:30am to meet up with Langy for a shorter than normal Sunday Long Run in light of my shin pain the last fortnight and Langy's recovery from his 83:30 Melbourne Half PB. We ran the entire 70 mins in steady rain that was just short of pouring rain. I love running in the rain, not only for the refeshing nature of the activity but because I know I'm getting an edge on some of my competitors who will chicken out of a run in these conditions! Even better, I experienced very little shin discomfort for the duration of the run. Interestingly enough, Bruno said after my rub on Friday that my hip alignment was "perfect - best its ever been". For all I know, this could have been a contributing factor.

MAJOR change of direction for my short term running future

I reached an unwanted milestone last week - ten months battling the dreaded shin splints. When I tell people how long that I've had shin splints, most assume that I'm overtraining but I can say in all honesty that I'm actually undertraining! I have only exceeded 50k's a week a handful of times in the last six months. That's not overtraining. There is little doubt that my shin splints are caused by my flawed gait and my overstriding and I continue to work hard to overcome those flaws. In fact, I've have just hit upon the idea that my walking gait could be contributing to my problem. Those who have struggled to keep up with me when walking will know that I walk extemely fast, and overstride considerably when doing so. I'll be investigating very shortly to see the extent if any, my walking gait is contributing to my probs.

Moving on, following discussions with all parties involved in my running career, I've decided upon the following changes:

- All speedwork will be run at no faster than 3:50 mins/km which is at least thirty seconds slower than my top speed. Possibly, I may not go faster than 4:00-4:10. In order to ensure that I still have a decent workout at speedwork, I will shorten my standing recoveries and run quicker jogging recoveries and top that off with a brisk warm down run. I may occasionally run at top speed for 8 x 500 and 5 x 1k sessions or a 3K Time Trial but these instances will be few and far between. I will do very little racing. My gait flaws are exacerbated by running fast, so hopefully, this move will speed up my recovery from shin splints.
- I will slowly increase my Sunday Long Runs back up to two hours and my Friday Recovery Run up to one hour. Shortly, I will resume my Wednesday Midweek Long Run starting at 20 minutes, increasing at five minutes per week and working my way up to 70-90 minutes.

In summary the above changes will see me reduce the intensity and speed of my running but compensate for that by bumping up the overall weekly mileage. I won't be getting too many PB's from my new plan but hopefully the reduced stress on my legs will assist my recovery from shin splints whilst the increased mileage will build up my endurance and strengthen me for when I'm ready to resume full on speedwork. I've spent the last three-four months following a plan of continuing to train hard at speedwork, but only running four times a week with at least 36 hours between runs to allow the shins extra recovery time. The plan sounded good in theory but unfortunately, has not worked.

Fingers crossed that these changes will help. If not I might have to try something out of the left field such as that suggested by Bruno when I got a rub this morning. He told me of an elite ironman triathlete who overcame shint splints by doing ALL of his running on a treadmill for six months, the theory being that running on the tready forces you to shorten your stride somewhat, thus overcoming gait flaws and the softer surface is also a little kinder on the shins. That would be as boring as hell, but I'll do it if I have to!!

40 mins this AM for 8k's at 4:52 mins/km

Another jog at speedwork

4 mins, 30 sec JR, 2 min, 30 sec SR, repeat, 4 mins, hill

The shins are not quite recovered from the bashing they received late last week so I just cruised through today's session at perhaps 4:30-4:40's. The shins pulled up ok.

Perhaps of more interest today was running injury - type # 793. As per Tuesday, I drove into speedwork with a heated medi gel pack taped to my left shin with electrical tape. Only problem was that I heated the pack for two minutes on high in the microwave intead of two minutes on medium. I didn't realise the error until after I had taped the gel pack on at a set of traffic lights and only started to feel the burning hot pain after traffic was moving again. I contemplated reaching down to rip the gel pack of my shin, but reasoned with myself "Aaaarghh, leave it - a little bit of pain will toughen you up and never really hurt anyone." So the first couple of minutes of my drive saw me shaking my leg leg in between depressing the clutch until the pain subsided. I thought nothing more of it until after the session ended and I noticed nasty red burn marks on my left shin!!! So before breakfast, a trip to the medicine cabinet for aloe vera was required!

A jog at speedwork

15 mins of 30 secs fast, 30 secs jogging recovery

After pulling up sore on Sunday there was doubt in my mind that I would be able to run this morning, let alone run at a decent pace. I told MJ last night that there was a 40% chance that I would not make it to speedwork at all, if the legs didn't feel right upon awakening. I was slow getting out of bed in the morning and for just a millisecond, contemplated sleeping in and giving the legs additional rest. However, I stuck to the plan of testing the legs with a short jog down the road. 400 metres later, the right shin felt good and the left just a little niggly and I pronounced myself fit to train. Soon after, I jumped into the car with a heated gel pack taped to my left shin with electrical tape to give it every opportunity to warm up before further running. This worked well and my left shin felt much better after arriving at South Bank and jogging to the Ship Inn. I will make this a regular feature of my pre training rituals.

Arriving late at the Story Bridge, I joined the rest of the group after having covered the three k's with little discomfort. Whilst the rest of the group alternated fast 30 sec efforts with jogging recoveries, I just did a one paced session of running for 15 minutes at five min per k pace with every one overtaking me whilst running fast and me overtaking them whilst they did JR's. I then wrapped up the morning continuing back to the Ship Inn with little discomfort.

Noosa campaign hits a pothole

Sunday Long Run 45 mins, 9kms @ 5:05 mins/km

Well, its official. My Noosa campaign has struck a pothole. A slowish run on Friday at much slower than my normal low 4:50 pace for these long and recovery runs was followed by an identically slowish run today. Both runs I had to endure worse than the usual shin discomfort with today's effort being torpedoed by the aforementioned shin discomfort half way through. When I got back to the car for a water stop half way through the planned 80 minute run, I was favouring a leg when standing to drink and called it quits on the spot. Running another forty minutes was not going to help me achieve my Noosa target so it was not worth the risk. To say I was filthy would be an understatement.

I've spent the day at work thinking hard about changes to my short term training strategy and all will be revealed tomorrow.

Friday Recovery Run

Friday Recovery Run 45 mins, 9 kms @ 5:02 mins/km

As part of my drive to top up my cardio fitness with Noosa looming fast, I started the day with a 70 min low intensity ride on the bike in hot conditions at 10am. Worked up a nice little sweat there.

At 4pm, I was working up a sweat again, this time enduring some shin discomfort to complete a 45 minute recovery run.

Solid speedwork session

6 x 2 minutes, 45 second Standing Recovery

My shins had made themselves felt in the preceeding 24 hours so it was with some trepidation that I ventured to the Ship Inn for speedwork this morning. Fortunately, the legs felt good in the three kilometre warm up to the Story Bridge and I was able to throw myself with vigour into the session. With Langy taking it easy in his final hitout prior to the Melbourne half and Slash a no show, I led from the front in most of the reps along with Gary M, Glenda and newcomer, Ben. The lack of hard aerobic exercise in the past fortnight started to take its toll by the time the fifth rep came around. I then reminded myself that Noosa was only a month away, dug deep and gave myself a massive flogging in the final rep, collapsing to the bitumen in exhaustion after a lung busting conclusion. The legs pulled up well and I was a satisfied man at the end of the session.

Nevertheless, I now plan to reduce the number of "stretcher sessions" that I have at speedwork until I have completely beaten the devil that is my shin splints into submission . Whilst its a great feeling to train yourself to exhaustion and my cardio vascular system can cope with it, I believe that my shins can't cope with it every time. Anyone who has ever tried to run fast when utterly exhausted will know the feeling of having a heavy stride with legs flaying about awkwardly. I believe when I push myself through exhaustion to continue running fast, the flaws that I have with my running technique exarcerbate the stress placed upon my shins. The trick now, is to learn to train hard at speedwork and reach the threshold of exhaustion, but not cross it and instead continue to run with a smooth and economical stride that places the least amount of stress on my shins. Only time will tell how successful this is.

Pat Carroll Running Group 3K Time Trial

Pat Carroll Running Group 3K TT

With just a week of running under my belt after the shin probs, I judged the risk of injury from a fast TT to be too high for my liking. Instead, I had to be content with joining Langy in running 3:55 k's as he put the finishing touches on his Melbourne Half Marathon preparation. To ensure that I had a good workout, Langy and I immediately continued running back up Riverside Drive after crossing the finish line and proceeded to help tow some of the later finishers home. Some great PB's out there from the likes of Allyson, Kate and Tara who's run will certainly have Tesso, Clairie, Jan and Tori looking over there shoulders!! Then whilst everyone else sucked in the big ones after thier hard efforts, Langy and I didn't take time to get our breaths and instead ran briskly back to the Ship Inn covering about 2k's at 4:15 mins/km pace. So in summary, my morning added up to about 5.5k's at a brisk pace with virtually no recovery. I was pretty happy with how the shins felt during the session and they only started make themselves felt when we were enjoying our recovery nibbles of nuts, frogs, snakes, watermelon and pineapple, washed down with PB and Up and Go. Gees, recovery nibbles after Pat's sessions are becoming a real smorgasboard!!

Life's good!!!

Sunday Long Run

Sunday Long Run - 70mins, 14k's @ 4:56 mins/km

Hit the Kedron Brook path with Langy at 7:30am this morning. Ideally, I'd be running around two hours for my Sunday Long Run at this stage of my preparation for Noosa, but the week off put paid to that. I'm working my way back gradually increasing it by 15 mins/3km's a week. Yes, its a little more than the golden rule of "do not increase weekly or long run mileage by more than 10% from week to week " but, surely this rule is negligible after just a week off? Anyway, in nice, warm conditions, Langy and I got through the run comfortably and Langy is looking in great shape for a fast half in Melbourne next Sunday!! My right shin protested just a little at various stages of the run, but pulled up pretty well.

An an aside, can you believe that we got our first rain in some months on Friday arvo, just as I had finished applying mortar to the rocks lining the garden beds in my front yard. Some of the mortar ended up going all runny and I'm going to have to reapply it in some areas next week. Here's one person who isn't all that happy at the timing of this little break in the drought!!

Go the Cowboys tonight!!!

Friday Recovery Run

Friday Recovery Run - 40 mins, 8k's @ 4:59 mins/km

Struggled to get into a rhythm this morning but nevertheless completed the run with minimal discomfort to shins. Got a good rub from Bruno afterward and spent most of the time talking about the pros and cons of my current running program. As a Sub 3 Marathoner himself, its always good to be able to talk running with Bruno as opposed to boring non running topics!!

Starting to think deeply about my direction post Noosa - stay tuned!!

A Barry Crocker!!

2 x 2k, 1 x1k, 1:30min Standing Recovery - 7:26, 90, 7:38, 90, 3:45

The Group had one of those days where despite the best intentions, things just didn't quite go right. Slash expressed concerns with a sore calf prior to training and with Rottnest a few weeks away was clearly in a dilemma as to whether to run hard or easy. After doing two strong 2k reps, Slash then eased himself home after a bit of a flareup - hope all is ok, Mate! Langy ran an excellent session but was just a little disappointed afterward as the brisk headwind and a not quite complete training base deprived him of grasping what could have been some outstanding times. Still, an average of 7:04's for the 2k's is top stuff, Mate! I arrived at West End with the intention of running at 90% effort, but after the first rep, it was clear that my body was unable to run at 90% pace without using more than 90% effort. I was feeling a little depleted and in hindsight, I didn't eat enough yesterday and my muscles are still a tad sore from the comeback session on Tuesday. So, after a solid first rep of 7:26, I eased of just a little but still ran at a brisk enough pace to get the blood circulating and finished the session without any signs of shin soreness. Allyson then provided the final Barry Crocker touch of the morning taking a tumble as we exited Kurilpa Park and hit the South Bank Boardwalk. Fortunately, only her pride was hurt :)

I then went home and had a 90 minute snooze. Prior to my running life, I used to get down on myself when doing this, but now I congratulate myself on giving my body some extra recovery time.

Speedwork comeback

9 x 500m, 1 min Standing Recovery - 112, 36, 113, 29, 111, 29, 111, 41, 112, 31, 108, 33, 111, 29, 111, 26, 108 - Avg 5000's - 110.77 secs, Avg SR's 31.75 secs

It was with enormous relief that I got through my comeback speedwork session unscathed, hardly feeling any discomfort at all. It was a cracker of a session under the Story Bridge with Slash and Langy setting a torrid pace up front closely followed by Phil, Scotty and Glenda - top stuff guys!!!! Alas, I eased back into the fast stuff conservatively running at around 80% effort with my 110.77 second average for the 500's being well outside my PB of 95 seconds for this session. However, to ensure I had a good blow, I started each rep with the A-Team and that cut my recovery time almost in half and ensured a good cardio vascular workout. Whilst my team mates took it easy in the warm down after their efforts, I ran at a brisk pace back to the Ship Inn to continue the cardio workout. Am definitely a happy boy right now - Noosa, here I come!!! I was not the only one returning to speedwork today with Davo also back, complete with a specially fitted compression bandage/glove on his arm after a kitchen cooking oil accident. Davo's long awaited comeback will definitely strengthen the squad.

Moving onto the quirky, I had a rather unsual drama last night. Whilst shaving with my right hand, I reached up to scratch my sideburn and proceeded to nick my right earlobe with the razor, drawing plenty of blood in the process!! In what was clearly my second worst ever shaving cut, I had to stem the flow of blood with vaseline and then patch it up with cotton wool and elastoplast tape so I could get to bed without staining the sheets. And in a case of bad timing of the highest magnitude, the incident occured the night before my annual hearing test during which I am required to clamp headphones to my ears!!! Fortunately the test went well, with the audiologist agreeing to wear gloves and saving me the time and expense of a rescheduled test. And my worst shaving cut? Definitely one morning when in Grade 12, when I was running late for roll call as usual and in my haste, proceeded to commit the cardinal sin of shaving across my top lip. Gees, I would have lost a litre of blood that day - dashing off to class with a roll of toilet paper in my bag and holding toilet paper to my bleeding upper lip till well after lunch!! Aaaah, the memories!!

Comeback #7 continues

Sunday Long Run - 50 mins, 10k's @ 4:58 mins/km

My shins pulled up ok from my 30 minute cruise on Friday so I bumped it up to 50 minutes for my Sunday Long Run. That should really be a Sunday Short Run, by my standards. Anyway, I hit the Kedron Brook path at about 10am in nice warm conditions and was only slightly dehydrated from consuming an unknown quantity of XXXX at my AFL Grand Final Party yesterday. After an uneasy first k which went by in a very slow 5:18, the rest of the run was solid with minimal discomfort in the shins. I pulled up well as the day went on and the comeback is going to plan so far. I will continue to conservatively increase mileage and intensity over the next week.

Moving on, we had a great AFL Grand Final Party. Every one of the ten blokes in attendance chipped in $5 towards a group bet and we spent the afternoon trying to ride home our $20 on the Eagles to win by 1-19, paying $4.20. Sadly, the Eagles fell just short of collecting for us, but we did nab Chris Judd's Norm Smith Medal win and used the proceeds to call out for pizza whilst we watch the Tigers-Saints game. Now, my beloved Broncos may have exited the premiership race last week, but gees, there was some consolation over the weekend in watching both Saint and Parra exit the race, going down as short priced favs. They were two of the most enjoyable sporting chokes I've had the pleasure of watching!

Here we go again - Comeback # 7

Friday Run - 30 mins, 6k's at 4:57 mins/km

It was with some tentativeness, that I headed out for my run alongside the Kedron Brook this morning. The left shin was making its presence felt every now and then prior to the run. I began with a 1km walking warmup and then did an easy 30 mins, breathing a little harder than normal. The left shin was a little dodgy for the first three k's but the right shin felt satisfactory throughout. Checked my logbook and noted that this is my seventh comeback since December of last year where I have returned to running after taking at least a week off to rest my shins. Just don't call me the Comeback King!

Got home from my run and hopped into the pool to cool down the legs and read the second issue of Run For Your Life magazine. This edition marks my publishing debut after I contacted the publisher, Daniel Green a few months ago and offered to write Qld Race Reports. My race reports of the Redcliffe Jetty to Jetty, Ipswich Park to Park and Bridge to Brisbane appear in this edition. Most of you will know that I have long term ambitions to write a novel some day, so this is a good opportunity to practice my writing a few times a month and give something back to the sport of running. I must say that writing a race report is harder than it looks. For example, I could have easily written 1000 words about the Bridge to Brisbane but had to submit a report no longer than 380 words, so I have to be careful not to get carried away and wax lyrical about Susie Power's running style when I should be concentrating on providing succinct and detailed reports. Most race reports, particularly from our competitors, Runner's World are quite bland, so I try to make my reports as informative as possible, providing info on how the race was run along with some splits where possible and throw in some running lingo as well, preferably a quotable quote from the winner. I then add a snippet about the winner such as what kind of lead up they had to the race and what race they are running next. If anyone reads the mag and has an opinion on my work, don't hesitate to get in touch with me with feedback, be it some advice or constructive criticism.

Fourth missed session in a row

The shins are feeling much better and was close to returning to training today but as is always the case when returning from injury, I wait till I feel ready to run again and then add an extra day to my recovery period.

I made up for my enforced break by working up a light sweat and giving my place a massive outdoor spring clean - mowing, pruning, edging etc. Spent a fair bit of time on the pool also and it should be in pristine shape for my 5th Annual SportsCentre AFL Grand Final Party on Saturday.

Third missed session in a row

My shins are slowly on the mend after the latest flare up and I judged last night that I would be best served by resting. With the Noosa Tri looming seven weeks away, I feel its better to err on the side of caution and make sure that I come back when I'm ready as there is still plenty of time to get the necessary training in to achieve my goals at Noosa.

So instead of an early night last night, I broke my no drinking rule for Monday nights and had a late night watching Robert De Niro and Joe Pesci in Casino whilst enjoying a few XXXX's.

Great Saturday, Shocking Sunday

Had a fabulous day yesterday, celebrating my Grandmother's 90th Birthday at Oxley's on the River for lunch, where I enjoyed a pork cutlet. All the interstate rellies invaded Brisbane and were in attendance at Oxleys along with my family. An interesting footnote to the day came when I put my hand up to pay the $1100 bill with my credit card whilst everyone else rustled up the cash to pay me. When I paid the bill, the Manager slapped a sticker on my credit card that entitles me to 25% off all my bills at Oxleys, presumably for the life of the credit card. I guess there are some advantages to putting your hand up to settle the bill, after all.

The rest of the weekend was not so good - in fact it was downright ugly. The tale of woe can be broken up into three parts:

1. Attended the River Run on Sunday morning with MJ to cheer on team mates and interview the winners for my Run For Your Life race report. It was great to see Langy, Clairie, Jan and Scotty B all put in huge runs for PB's whilst Slash and Phil also put in nice efforts. I was filthy though, becuase an opportunity for another 5k PB had gone begging. As the morning went on my and the time on my feet increased, my shins began to throb and it became apparent that were not going to stand up to a Sunday Long Run, so I had no choice but to miss my second run in a row. I was talking to my fellow member of the Shin Splints Club, Jodie and commenting that its moments like these when you feel the only option is to surgically remove the damned things!
2. The Bullets lost....twice
3. The Broncos lost

The shins did not improve as the day wore on and Matty is a cranky boy, right now.

Shin soreness still prominent

Shin soreness was still around this AM so skipped the Friday Recovery Run. Bruno found the lower shin muscles to be very tight during this morning's massage, confirming the obvious. I do know now that the soreness was caused by my flu coupled with incorrectly executing a few of my glute firing exercises. I'm taking it as easy as I can today and tomorrow and hoping to be right for the planned 100 min Sunday Long Run.

Big weekend coming up with my Grandmother's 90th Birthday Party at Oxley's on the River and most of the rellies are in town. Coupled with work, attending the River Run, footy finals, a Bullets home game on Sunday night and hopefully the Sunday Long Run, six hours sleep will be a luxury the next two nights.

Fartlek under Story Bridge

13:30 mins of fartlek - 1 min hard, 1 min jog, 30 secs hard, 30 secs jog, 15 secs hard, 15 secs jog - repeat 4 times.

With the River Run scheduled for Sunday and a good number of the squad participating in it, it was a shorter and sharper session this morning. It wasn't too sharp for me though as my right ankle and lower shin region were a little inflamed. Strangely enough, I only felt discomfort(not pain) when I had stopped running, but nevertheless, I ran a cautious session at about 90-95% effort. That still entailed running at a pretty good pace and I had a fair blow when the session ended. I think I'm completely over the flu now, but my breathing whilst running may be still a little short of peak performance.

After such a small turnout on Tuesday, the squad doubled in size today and many of the regulars were back with a vengeance including the amazing Jo, having her last session before heading to Berlin for their Marathon and hopefully a "Sub 3". I too, intend to travel overseas for big Marathon events but not for a few years yet. Off the top of my head, my most desirable overseas Marathon events to contest are in order - Boston, Chicago, New York, Berlin, Rotterdam, Fukuoka, Beppu(Japan), Lake Biwa(Japan) and Paris. I will need to qualify for some of the aforementioned, but that won't be a problem.

Low point, very low point.

17 mins of hills in Botanic Gardens

Woke up in an extremely foul mood this morning after the Ashes debacle concluded during the night and it was honestly the first time in over a year of training with the Pat Carrollers that I didn't want to go to speedwork.....and I love speedwork. I'm the World's poorest loser and that's never going to change. A triple scotch was a far more appetising prospect than training this morning. If not for my new strict rule of no drinking on Monday and Wednesday's, I most likely would have got hammered last night. My foul mood was heightened by my back being a little sore from sleeping in a funny position and my shins continuing to give me mild grief.

So, grumpy Matty turned up late to speedwork and reluctantly went through his paces. Whilst the rest of the squad did their workout on a route in the Gardens that traversed grass, I did a solo workout near the squad, but staying on the pavers. I worked the hills strongly and completed an honest session. Wrapped up the session with a solid tempo warm down with Pat. The A-Team was absolutely decimated this morning, with Jodie joining Aaron and Peter on the injured list, Davo still recovery from his accident, Jonesy out of town and Glenda, Phil and Peter J no shows. Langy and Slash were also absent, no doubt recovering from a bender after last night's debacle. Possibly, they don't share my no drinking policy for Monday nights. In the absence of the aforementioned and with yours truly running solo, Scotty B was a runaway leader up front this morning.

Backing up after a bender

Sunday Long Run - 90 mins, 18k's @ 4:55 mins/km

Whoah! Things gotta a little out of hand of Saturday Night. After warming up with a bbq and beers at my place, the boys and I headed to Suncorp Stadium to watch a frustrating Broncos loss marred by several dodgy calls from our nemesis, referee Steve Clark. We then stopped at the Caxton where someone decided it was appropriate that we drown our sorrows in something a little stronger than XXXX and before I knew it, we had worked our way through a rounds of scotches. RooBoy, Big Fella and I then decamped the premises and took our three man band to the Casino, indulging in some skylarking along the way - you don't need to know what we got up to! Our luck for the night did not improve on the blackjack tables and I left the premises with my wallet a little lighter than it should have been.

Woke up in a world of hurt and texted Langy to inform him I was not gonna make our 11am start time for our Sunday run. I received a deserved sledging from Langy in response. I did however recover by noon and at 4pm did a solid 90 min run along Kedron Brook and out to Nudgee Beach. The shins were a little sensitive at times and I'm monitoring them extremely closely at the moment.

Friday Recovery Run

Friday recovery run, 40 mins, 8k's @ 4:50 mins/km

Left the singlet behind and did a easy run in the warm afternoon sun at 4pm enjoying the warmth and sweat on my bare skin. My right shin however, did not enjoy the run and my Brooks Glycerin 3's with about 350-400k's on them are now on notice.

After hosting Langy at my place last night for the cricket and Langy yelling vicious abuse at Brett Lee, I'm off to my mate RooBoy's tonight for a trifecta of cricket, NRL and AFL spread across two tv's. With RooBoy the swimmer for the mighty Northies triathlon team, our upcoming assault on the Noosa Team Tri will no doubt be discussed.

A solid hitout

6 x 2mins, 45 sec Standing Recovery

As part of my plan to build up my speed gradually, post flu, I ran at approximately 3:30-3:40 min/km pace this morning. This entailed running running behind Jodie and Glenda and pacing myself off their efforts as I hovered at the back of the A-Team. Up front Slash took the honours closely followed by Langy. They had to do the hard yards alone as the A-Team was severely depleted this morning with the Peters, Phil, Aaron and Davo all off the scene whilst Jonesy like myself is on the way back after a shocker of a flu.

On the last rep, I easily managed to pick up the speed a little whilst sledging and encouraging Slash and Langy to catch up to me as we ran back to our starting point. That I was able to run fast and expend energy talking on that last rep was a good sign and I'll be ready to go flat strap again next Tuesday.

Don't we have a HUGE weekend of sport coming up? Lets see, tonight, I might gather with Adam and a few of the boys for a few beers to watch the start of the Fifth Test. Tomorrow night, its AFL and NRL finals on Friday Night Football. Saturday, I'm hosting a pre match BBQ for the boys before we head to Suncorp Stadium for the Broncos Quarter Final. Then doubtless, we will head to the Casino to watch the other finals that follow it along with the cricket. And we have another NRL quarter final on Sunday arvo and the US Open Final the next morning to go with the NFL season openers. God, I love September!! Life's good....sensational even!

The joy of pacing

Pat Carroll Running Group 3K Time Trial - September - 11:51

I had a minor cold yesterday which ensured that I did not try to do anything reckless and push my flu weakened body beyond its limits at this morning's 3K TT. So, I put on my Pacer's cap and looked for someone around the 4:00 min/km mark who was shooting for a PB. Tesso was running Marathon pace before her Sydney Marathon this Sunday so I ended up offering to pace Jan. Sitting on a PB of 11:57, Jan was planning a red hot go at breaking it this morning.

After discussing split times with Jan, we set off in beaut Spring early morning weather. It was pretty hard for me to slow down enough without going too slow and I ended up dragging Jan along a little too fast with a 3:42 first k, but I omitted to mention this to Jan and fortunately, she did not look at her watch! Instead, I just told her we were right on pace and proceeded to ease of the gas a little for a steady, but strong second k in 4:08. Coming home for the last k, I became more vocal telling Jan to embrace the pain for the next few minutes so she could have a smile on her face all day after her PB. I got louder in the finishing stretch, telling Jan we had to sprint to make it and Jan responded strongly to knock six seconds of her PB and clock 11:51! As always, its great for a pacer to see the reaction of someone who has put in a big run with the face going through a range of emotions from disbelief to exultation to a content smile and Jan had just that this morning!

For me, I was pleased to maintain my high strike rate as a successful pacer. I have paced MJ, Chelle, Clairie and now Jan to 3KTT PB's whilst four out of my group of seven ran under goal times at the Gold Coast Half Marathon. That's a strike rate of 8/11 and I might have to start charging for my pacing services :) I like to think that its my good pace judgement and varied range of motivational quotes that gets people home but Clairie would tell you that my success is moreso due to people running hard so they "can get this loud mouthed nut out of their ear as soon as possible"! Either way, it was a lot of fun this morning and the legs and lungs pulled up well.

Sunday Long Run

Sunday Long Run - 75mins, 15k's @ 5:05 mins/km

After a rare night shift in the office that culminated in a 2am departure, I grabbed seven hours sleep and headed out to the Kedron Brook path for my first Sunday long run in three weeks. Beginning in warm conditions at 11am, my legs felt good but after 1500m it was obvious that my lungs were still getting over the flu as I was gasping for air somewhat. I therefore concentrated on keeping my HR down for the duration of this run, hence the slower than normal 5:05 min/km pace. I'm in the recovery week of my four week program block, hence the 75 min effort instead of the usual 100 min effort.

At least the run has put paid to any lofty ambitions of a heroic 3KTT pb against the odds! I will spend this week gradually building my speed up with the aim of being fully fit and rest to run fast at speedwork on 13/9. Hopefully, my patience and caution will be rewarded down the track.

He's baaaaack!!!!

Friday Recovery run 30 mins/6km @ 5:03 mins/km

At long last, drove out to the Nundah Criterium and headed out along the Kedron Brook path for my first run in over a week. I got a stitch, the lungs felt a tad heavy and the legs were a little rusty, but I couldn't care less as I enjoyed and easy half hour in the warm sun. The shins felt good. Got my fortnightly rub afterward and am now brimming with energy to attack a "List of things to do" that has been neglected during my bout of ill health.

A huge weekend ahead beginning with drinks at the Albion Park dogs this arvo for departing work mate, Michael followed by drinks with fellow CoolRunning runners later this evening in the city. Can't wait for the start of the footy finals!!

Life's good....sensational even!!

A flu with bigger punch that Ali

Returned to work yesterday after missing 2.5 days of work and it was not a good move. My corner of the building is known as the "Icebox". As a runner now accustomed to training in a singlet at 6am in the middle of winter, I normally smirk at my shivering colleagues wrapping themselves in warm clothes whilst I work comfortably in just a business shirt and slacks. I was not smirking yesterday as I shivered uncontrollaby despite wearing a jumper and later adding a jacket to go with the aforementioned attire. By the end of the day, I was a mess, with a freely running nose and watery eyes. Thankfully, I will not have to be in the office again till Saturday.

I battled the watery eyes and runny nose whilst trying to get to sleep last night and then slept for 11 hours. This morning, I am still well short of 100% and not a happy man after missing another speedwork session. I can't remember the last time I had the flu for this long and am beginning to think that I must have picked up a second flu that blended in seamlessly with the first one.

Four consecutive training sessions have been now been missed and the River Run on 18/9 has now been axed from my race schedule. On the bright side, I've hopefully got the annual flu out of the way well before the all important Noosa Tri 10k run leg. Even better, winter has ended and as I look outside at the sun beating relentlessly down on the browning grass of my backyard, its warmth fills the cockles of my heart. Its Spring! Which means we are one season closer to Summer! You beauty! "I love a sunburnt country............."

Speedwork attendance streak ends

I've taken an eight count, but am slowly rising to my feet. This flu has been frustrating. By no means is it an extremely bad flu, but my condition has remained unchanged since Sunday. Pissed off about ending my streak of 27 consecutive attendances at speedwork. All day yesterday, I was committed to keeping the streak intact, even if I delayed my recovery in the process. Fortunately, sanity finally prevailed last night!

As is usually the case when I'm sick, I took the opportunity to read a novel that will inspire my own attempt at writing a novel some years down the track. This I did by re-reading John Grisham's The Pelican Brief for the umpteenth time.

Flu strikes

Woke up this morning with a sore throat and by the time I had finished breakfast, I was down for the count as other flu symptoms took hold. Had an easy day from the comfort of a mattress thrown on the floor of my loungeroom as I watched the footy and finished reading the Deek biography. Not too upset about missing my Sunday long run, given the concerns I had with my shins on Friday - my body needs a rest and I should be right for Tuesday speedwork. Not sure whether I should be blaming Tesso or Langy for passing the lurgy on.

My brother Adam came 5th in the Binna Burra to O'Reilly's leg of the Lamington Classic on Saturday running the 25k in over the trails in 1:53:12. Good to see a second top ten finish for the family in less than a week. Benno, any chance of you finding a suitable race in the UK to make it 3/3? :)

As an interesting aside, Adam only runs for fitness and the occasional adventure race and his 5k PB is currently only a minute behind mine. Last year we staked a $50 bet, each betting the other that he would have the best PB over 10k by the age of 40. Given that I'm 30 and the young fella is 23, I've got ten years to set a 10k PB, preferably something intimidating and distant like sub 32 mins. Adam then has seven years remaining to beat the time and win the bet!! May the best man win!!

Skipped Friday recovery run

My shins still haven't quite recovered from my hard 5k at Noosa so I've just made the descision to skip this arvo's 40 min, 8k Friday Recovery Run. Gees, its never easy to skip a run even though deep down, you know its probably the right thing to do. Believe me when I say it takes more discipline and committment for me to skip a run and rest my body than it does to do the hard yards and go out on a run. Skipping a recovery run will not harm my chances of a PB in the Brisbane River Run 5k in three weeks, but missing a week if the shins flare up badly after a run this afternoon would most certainly harm my chances! Its tough when your heart and soul wants to train like an animal and run 17ok's a week and your body is only ready to do 50k a week at the moment!

Rest assured that the shins are not feeling that bad - and certainly, they are no where near what they were feeling like at the height of my shins splints. I'm really taking the resting of my legs to extremes - I'm going to spend the rest of the arvo lying down, watching a DVD, before heading off to the Broncos tonight. I'm in the process of accumulating a collection of the entire James Bond series so will watch From Russia With Love.

Maintaining the momentum

2min/30 sec JR/1min/30 sec JR/2min/30 sec SR, Repeat, 5 mins, one hill

Today, I maintained the momentum I have gained over the past three months by attending my 27th consecutive speedwork session, dating back to May. There is no doubt that this consistency is the prime reason behind my good form of late. Because I spent six months doing very little running when battling shin splints, my enthusiasm and motivation are currently sky high. I really find it difficult to imagine my current levels of enthusiasm and motivation subsiding. Touch wood that my body stays injury free!!

Today's session saw us tap into our endurance bases a little, running a little short of top speed whilst we did very short jogging recoveries following most of our efforts. With Slash absent on a work junket and no doubt sampling fine reds whilst at it, Aaron and I led from the front. We put in an honest and satisfying session that should stand us in good stead for an important week of training to come next week. Jodie, Glenda and the improving Langy put in sharp efforts not far behind us. I'm really envious of Glenda at the moment - she's qualified for the National Cross Country Champs to be held in Adelaide this weekend and will be pulling on a beautiful maroon Queensland race singlet! Go get 'em Mate!! I'll have to add that feat to my list of goals - wear the Qld singlet in a race, perhaps if I nominate for the Australian Marathon Championship, that is incorporated into the Gold Coast Marathon?

Just received a copy of the 1984 bio of "Deek" in the mail from Coolrunner, Sparkie. Those who know me well will be surprised to know that I have not yet read a bio of Deek, simply because they are out of publication, hard to find and not available in most libraries. I was fortunate that Sparkie happened to stumble across this copy in a second hand book store and as he already had it, he generously put it up on CoolRunning available to the first repondant which happened to be yours truly. Read the first chapter in the pool after training, during my standing water cold recovery and the book doesn't waste any time painting a picture of Deek as possibly the most disciplined and driven athlete ever to represent Australia! Can't wait to get stuck into the rest of this book!

Easy hitout at Speedwork

6 x 1min, 1 x 3min, 45 sec Standing Recovery

With my legs still stiff and sore from Sunday's hard 5k run, I didn't get out of third gear this morning. A year ago, I might have pushed myself to the brink with a hard session, but I'm a smarter runner now and my focus this week is all directed at having a strong session on Thursday. I believe that following a hard race on a Sunday, its better to have an easy session on the Tuesday, continue to recover and then have a high quality session on the Thursday. The alternative of pushing it too hard on Tuesday could result in a Thursday session lacking in quality work, if I have not recovered by then.

The Group was light on numbers this morning, with many Noosa participants resting their weary legs and our new champion, Jodie taking it easy with a jogging recovery session. Aaron recovered far better from his sub 82 half than I did from a mere 5k run. I'll be looking forward to doing likewise when I get my mileage up. Strong session from Langy today, in the thick of the action with the A-Team as his comeback gathers momentum.

Back to earth with a thud.

Well, my fears expressed in yesterday's post appear to have been confirmed, with mounting evidence growing that the Noosa 5k course was short. Fellow participants have discussed the situation the on CoolRunning website and its pretty unamious from them and others that the course is short. I spent some time making calculations with my Timex, pen and paper and calculated that assuming the course is 150-200m short, I ran somewhere between 17:15 to 17:25. Ironically, I would have been absolutely thrilled with this time prior to Sunday, but after thinking that I had ventured into sub 17 territory, it has come as a bit of a let down. So, I won't be posting a 16:36 on my PB's listed to the right of this page, but I will be claiming the 7th place - no one can take it away from me!!

I'm really looking forward to going sub 17 for real and boy, its gonna be a sweet moment when I do!!

Noosa 5k - The race of my life.....so far!!

Noosa 5k 16:36 - 7th of 692

At about 8:51am this morning, I lunged across the finish line to just pip a rival in a desperate battle for 7th place and looked at my watch like a stunned mullet to see 16:36 staring up at me. A massive 69 second PB - how the hell did I manage that??

The training for my first serious race in nine months has been outstanding but my preparation in the final 24 hours wasn't too flash. I drove up to Noosa with MJ after a long day at work on Saturday and realised that I had forgotten my contacts and sunnies, meaning that I would have to race in my 3rd option, wearing my specs. As both MJ and I were late booking accomodation for Noosa, we ended up at the Tewantin Caravan Park in a cabin. As I drifted of to sleep amidst a coughing fit in the dusty cabin, I suggested to MJ that we would have been better of emulating Coach Pat who in his younger days, had been known to pitch a tent in the Noosa National Park the night before a race.

Race morning dawned and I felt good. Did a 2k warmup and watched the Half Marathon from various vantage points as part of my duties in reporting the race for Run For Your Life magazine, for whom I am compiling race reports. I also cheered on MJ and my team mates and really got fired up when team mate Jodie scored a stunning surprise win in the Half. If Jodie could push it to the brink for 21.1 k's then I would have no excuses for not doing likewise over 5k.

I took a position on the front row of the grid for the race and shortly prior to the horn, locked eyes with Coach Pat who was MC'ing the events and as we nodded to each other, Pat's instructions rang through my brain one more time "Treat Sunday more like a race than a Time Trial. Once the fields settles, your aim from this point is to either stick with the pack or pass them. Run aggressive and try and work you way through the field."

The horn sounded and I immediately took a prominent position near the head of the field and after two minutes, I was in a pack of five who were jostling for third with two leaders 20 metres further in front. With my legs feeling light and fresh and turning over quickly, the first k passed in 3:17, which was ten seconds faster than the plan and I eased off the gas just a touch, to avoid blowing up. The field began to string out in the second k and I was in ninth position, drafting behind two blokes running side by side. The second k went by in 3:34 and at this point the race really began. Cheered on by team mate Peter H at the turnaround, I surged into 8th position, but the pace was too hot to hold and I dropped back to 9th shortly after. With no three and four k signs for the 5k race contestants, I only had a rough idea of my pace at this point of the race, but I was more concerned with keeping in touch with 7th and 8th, bowling along five metres in front of me. The pain really started to set in 12 minutes into the race when I looked at my watch and thought "five minutes to go". The weak side of my brain tried to intervene at this point saying "You've done really well so far. You can slow down a little and almost certainly still get a PB. Take a look over your shoulder and see where 10th and 11th position are. If they are a long way back, you can slow down just a bit and still get a PB and top ten finish." The strong side of my brain shut down those thoughts - I honestly can't remember how though, as things became a bit blurry at this point as I fought to remain in touch with 7th and 8th, still five metres in front of me.

With about a kilometre to go, the fog in my brain cleared and my thought process became analytical and calculating - 7th place was the 17yo #3 runner for the GPS winning Nudgee College Cross Country Team - "He's faster than me, but I'm a Marathoner and I can go harder, longer and I'll get him". 8th place had a Domino's logo on the back of his singlet and was running well but with a loping stride - "Hang onto him - with that stride of his, you'll be able to outkick him at the end." I plumbed the depths of my stamina and tried to increase the pace just a little more. As we approached the bridge about 400m out from the finish line, the Nudgee runner faded a little from 7th and was passed by Domino's. I increased my speed even more, caught up to the Nudgee runner, dropped him straight away and approached a flat out sprint as cheering crowds and the finish chute loomed in sight. Domino's glanced over his shoulder and managed to increase his speed as I loomed two metres behind. I found one more gear (surely I didn't have any left?) and remained two metres behind Domino's as we rounded the bend of the finish chute, 50 metres from the line. Domino's didn't slow down and I didn't have another gear to overtake him but I said to myself "keep the foot down in case something happens". Almost as soon as I said that Domino glanced over his shoulder again, saw me still there, had a brain explosion and headed left for the 10k race finish line whilst I veered inside him to the correct finish line. Domino's realised his error and veered to the right, back inside but it was too late and I flashed across the line in 7th place with a sprinters finishing lunge. You bloody bewdy!!!!!

It took me ages to recover after the race and I was still wandering around in a bit of a daze, with weak legs for five minutes afterward. My team mates were as stunned as I was with my 16:36 time and the magnitude of the achievement began to sink in everytime a team mate congratulated me but I kept a lid on my excitement convinced that the time was too good to be true and something had gone wrong such as accidentally stopping my watch too early. However, there was no mistake with the time and the USM results confirmed it when released later in the afternoon. Still, until I run that time again or go over the course and measure it myself, a small part of me will keep saying "the course must have been short"' because a 69 second PB from a pretty fair 17:45 previous PB isn't supposed to happen.

This was the greatest run of my career to date because its the first time I believe that I've run a race to my potential and the effort has confirmed that my career goal of a national Marathon ranking and sub 2:43-45 marathon is not a pipe dream. A huge thanks to all my team mates, I can't possibly thank the many of you individually, but I'd like to offer a special thanks to Coach Pat for his guidance - you're an inspiration, Mate! Thanks to Aaron and Slash for pushing me in training the last two months. Thanks to my fellow shin splints sufferer, Jodie, for inspiring me with your Half Marathon win! Thanks to Tesso, Clairie and Chelle for the never ending encouragement. Thanks to MJ for the support and being there for me. And finally, a big thanks to Langy for his belief in my ability and for telling me several times over the last year "You're going to be a great runner one day, Mate".

As Jeff Fenech says, "I love you'se all."

A massage at last!!!

Friday Recovery Run - 40 mins, 8k's @ 4:55 mins/km

Everything continues to fall into place for Noosa after I enjoyed a nice solid recovery run this morning in warm conditions at 10am. I then got my first massage in three weeks and I swear that my legs were craving a rub as this is the first time in six months that I have missed my fortnightly Friday massage. However, I didn't have much choice in the matter as my masseuse, Bruno was in Helsinki rubbing the likes of Craig Mottram and Patrick Johnson at the World Athletics Championship. Now, I always put my country first, so Bruno didn't get any complaints from me that I had to miss a week!!

Three hours after the massage, the legs are feeling great. My only worry in the leadup to Sunday is yet another flare up in my upper back neck region with some minor trigger point pain from C5 in the spine. Bruno gave that region a good going over and coupled with the exercises I'm doing for it, it should hopefully go away soon.

Easy Thursday hitout

Speedwork - 15 mins of fartlek, 4 x 1min with JR, then 30 sec efforts with SR

With the popular Noosa Half/10k/5k just three days away, the air was lively with talk of ambitious goals, PB's to be broken and team mates PB's to beat(Can you hear me Langy/Davo!) Most of the squad took it easy today and just concentrated on turning the legs over at a reasonable speed and working up a mild sweat. I was no different, cruising through the session at about 80% effort with just one flat out sprint on the penultimate 30 sec effort.

The legs felt good and I'm really looking forward to Noosa - I will finalise my race plan over the next day or so in consultation with Coach Pat and after carefully perusing my training times.

As most of you know, i'm a big fan of the cold water wading/standing recovery after a long run or hard speedwork session. After Tuesday's hard session, I did my normal recovery at South Bank's Breaka Beach but 12 hours later, the legs were feeling a tad sorer than usual, not helped by a long day in the office. So, I arrived home at 9:30 pm, switched on the outdoor spotlight, grabbed the paper and a XXXX and stepped into the pool, staying there for ten minutes until I could barely feel my feet anymore. Whether it was the second cold water recovery or something else, I do not know, but I definitely pulled up a lot better than normal on Wednesday and have decided to continue the evening cold water recoveries where appropriate and perhaps even when I've simply got nothing better to do!

Noosa.....Here I come!!!

3 x 2k, 90 sec Standing Recovery - 6:57, 87, 7:01, 84, 6:55 - avg 6:57:66

My preparation for one of the longest and hardest speedwork sessions on our program was hardly ideal. The rot set in soon after arriving home late from work last night, but just in time for the start of play from Old Trafford. My brother Adam and I proceeded to argue for no less than 45 minutes on the best tactics for the Aussies to adopt for the final day of the test match. Adam argued that the batsmen should play their normal game as adopting an overly defensive mindset could be their undoing. I argued that our batsmen should be capable of reining in their natural games and shutting up shop like Dizzy has done at times and added that conceding the match at finishing at 2/180 would be just as demoralizing for the Pommie bowlers as going close to the out of reach target and losing most of our wickets would be. An old adage in warfare is that you can recover lost ground and lost time - you can not recover lost men. Transposed to cricket, this reads you can recover from a drawn match or a lost innings - you may not recover from one test down in a series. Anyway, neither man budged and inch and we ended in a stalemate. As such, I ended up not eating dinner till 9:30pm - discipline, Matty, discipline!!!

Hit the sack at 10:30 and was up again at 2:10 to watch the Aussies hold out over the last 17 nerve wracking overs, whilst I swore repeatedly at the television and the lamentable efforts of our top 7, Punter excluded.

So, it was on five hours sleep and a protesting stomach, that I attacked the first 2k rep at West End this morning. The A goal was to average 7:05's and the B goal was to better my avg of 7:11:33 that I achieved in my last crack at this session shortly before breaking down last year. Once I started running, I felt much better and it was just as well as the competition was fast and furious this morning with Phil K and Peter J running hard up front with the usual suspects Aaron, Slash and myself with Glenda not far away. With Coach Pat runnning hard up front all five of us went sub seven minutes for the first rep with myself at the back of the five man pack in 6:57. This was a small pyschological breakthrough for me, being the first time I had gone sub seven at this session. The pack got away from me in the second rep and I finished ten metres adrift, but with a very good time of 7:01. It would have been easy at this point in time to put in a 7:15 effort for the last leg which is always a brutal test of intestinal fortitude and still smash my PB for this session, but taking the easy way out is not my forte. I held with the pack for 200m at the start of the last rep and it quickly became apparent that the pace had slowed and I pushed forward alongside Aaron, determined to be on 7:00 pace at least for the first 500m and then I would see how I felt. As it turned out, I felt strong, so I tacked onto Aaron who was bowling along in front and the two of us cleared out from the pack. I turned strongly at the 1k and really put the pedal to the metal in the last 500 with the lungs screaming for oxygen as I just kept telling myself - "not much longer!". I was totally stoked at finishing in 6:55 for my fastest rep of the day. Whilst Phil K and Peter J hit the wall a tad in this last rep, Slash did nothing of sort, screaming past me in the last 200 and rocketing to the line impressively. Its very rare that someone goes past me and gives me windburn at the end of a race or tough session, but Slash did just that today - well done Mate - you're gonna kill them in Noosa!!

I'm absolutely thrilled at smashing my PB for this session by more than 13 secs for the 2k average and I'm confident that if I have a good preparation in the next few days, I will have every chance of breaking my 17:45 5kPB at Noosa. Bring it on!!!

Sunday 14/8 Brisbane Road Runners 10 Mile

Sunday Long Run, 100mins, 20k, avg 4:55mins/km

Got up at 5:30am and headed out to West End for my first Brisbane Road Runners race. The club conducts 25 races each year ranging from 5km to marathons and these events are held on a loop course at West End taking in Brisbane's scenic Riverside Drive. I arrived with less than one minute to the gun for the 10 Mile race, which for those of you born after 1972, is 16.09 k's. I then calmly proceeded to sign up for Club membership, pay my race fee, stretch and have a chat with Pat Carroller team mate Peter, who was on marshalling duties. Four minutes after the gun, I finally started the race and set off after the field in last place. Oh yeah, I should have mentioned that I was not racing and was simply taking the opportunity to do a training run on a accurately measured course. Secondly, I wanted to scout the course and familiarise myself with it in anticipation of the odd 5k race I will participate in over the Summer.

I enjoyed the experience and ended up passing a third of the field as I ran my usual Sunday long run pace, taking care not to accelerate as I ran down contestant after contestant. I must confess at this point that I often take sadistic pleasure in overtaking another huffing and puffing runner be they a backmarker I am lapping or someone I am overtaking. Often, no matter how tired I am or how much I'm hurting, I will pass the runner and try and pysch them out by putting a relaxed and serene expression on my face and keep my breathing very normal. Its a tactic that can pyschologically demoralise an opponent and may come in handy a few years down the track if I'm in a head to head duel to win a big race.

After completing the 16k's of the race, I immediately continued on and added another 4k's to the tally before heading to work. After the shoe debacle on Tuesday, this time I forgot to bring a fresh shirt to wear so I had to wear my warmup jumper around the office instead. Fortunately, its casual wear on the weekend's.

After work, I was off to the Broncos and watched referee Tim Mander butcher yet another Broncos game. Whilst the Broncos were outplayed for most of the part, they gutsed it out and hung in there for most of the game despite a misfiring backline and despite being given no favours by Mander. I've been convinced for a number of years that the Broncos win-loss record is significantly better under other referees that it is under Mander as is the penalty count and I'm now going to research these figures to prove my point!

Another "ho hum" Friday

Friday Recovery Run - 40mins, 8k, 4:58 mins/km

Its official, I'm struggling to make constructive use of my Friday's. Since taking a Weekend Supervisor's role at work two months ago(work Sat to Wed), I've generally enjoyed productive and fulfilling Thursday's after the endorphin rush of Thurs AM speedwork. However, on Friday's I tend to be lazy and sluggish until mid afternoon and am in dire need of something to kick start my day. As I do not do my Fri run till late afternoon to give my shins maximum recovery time, I've decided to start each Friday with a decent hitout in my home gym - from next week, that is.

In bitterly cold and overcast conditions this afternoon, I toddled along for a standard recovery run, then jumped straight into the car to defrost with the heater on high.

I should add that I started my day in a foul mood after logging on to see the progression made since the middle of the night. For what its worth, my thoughts on the cricket are:

- Dizzy - has to go. Kaspa back in to give us options with the old ball.
- Fielding - perhaps its time to bring back Simmo to run some drills. I think we've gotten a little too comfortable with the view from the top and the fielding has declined
- Batting - the moment of truth later tonight, with Clarkey(43) our only batsman averaging over 40 this tour.

Despite my criticisms, watch us hit back hard tonight though - never ever underestimate the heart of a Champion!!

Conquering the weak side of my brain

10 min, 1 min SR, 5 min

Pat introduced a new session today - either it was new or I missed it previously during my enforced absence with shin splints. Anyway, starting at the QUT Ampitheatre, the session called for a hard 5 mins outbound on the paths of the Botanic Gardens, turn around and then run back to the starting point even faster, arriving before the 10 mins was up. Following a 1 min standing recovery, the rep was repeated, this time over 2.5 mins out and back.

As has been the case for the last month now, Aaron, myself and Slash led the way up front. I chased Aaron all the way and never let him put more than 7-8 metres on me arriving back at the starting point with half a second to spare. There was a weak moment about two minutes into the start of the session when the weak side of my brain said to me "You don't need to chase Aaron, nor run this hard. You can afford to ease off just a little and still finish in the top three. Wouldn't that be something to be satisfied about?" I managed to quickly erase these negative thoughts by repeating the magic word "Noosa" to myself several times - a reminder of both the Noosa 5k next weekend and the big goal this year - the Noosa Tri 10k run leg. The magic word reminded me that the hard yakka was only going to last 15 mins and that I wouldn't be achieving any goals unless I embraced the pain - so I did! The fear of letting down my Northies team mates in the Noosa Tri is also a very powerful motivating factor. I ended up finishing the last minute of the 2.5 min out and back very strongly. As is the norm for sessions finishing at the QUT Amphitheatre, Coach Pat sent us straight up the steep 50m grass hill without a recovery. I love it! There's nothing like being totally spent, but knowing you only have to dig in for another 20 seconds and charging up that hill yelling "C'mon" to everyone!

Today saw an improved session from my good mate, Langy. A man who was a permanent fixture in the Top 3 runners earlier this year, Langy has been battling some injuries, followed by ill health and more recently the after effects of a procedure involving the cessation of his reproductive capacity. Despite this Langy never ceases to jump into the car brimming with optimism when he bums a lift from me on the way to speedwork. Today, he finally showed us just a little flash of his old dash. Keep it up Mate - the more competition in the Group, the merrier!

So, another satisfying session is in the bank. Less satisfying will be having to organise my tax return this afternoon, even though I am expecting a nice return. Oh well, we can't have everything.

Solo speedwork session........sort of

Speedwork - 15 mins of hills in Botanic Gardens

Today's session was voted both the "favourite" and "most painful" session at the recent Pat Carroll Running Group Formal night which is clearly indicative of the masochistic streak that prevails withing many of my team mates. My masochistic streak is quite healthy also, thank you. Sadly, I was unable to directly share today's "stretcher session" with my team mates. The last time I participated in this particular session and another similar one, both of which are run on the grass of Brisbane's beautiful Botanic Gardens, I suffered a very mild relapse of my shin splints. So, today I took the conservative option of staying off the uneven grass and running a loop of the Botanic Gardens' paved paths taking in a similar hill and one not to far away from the one which my team mates were throwing themselves up and down. Its one thing to do a long run by yourself at an easy pace, but its another thing to run hard and fast by yourself without the benefit of running in a pack or with another runner in front of you to chase. Fortunately, I was able to apply myself mentally and put in a solid session and wrapped it up with a good flogging all the way over the Goodwill Bridge at top speed with the in form Aaron and Slash.

Moving on, I had one of those runner's tunnel vision incident last night. I was preparing my running gear and work clothes for today's activities and whilst doing so, I was stretching repeatedly and really thinking deeply about today's speedwork session and my path to the Noosa 5k. That probably explains why I neglected to pack my black dress shoes. I didn't even contemplate taking an extra 25 minutes to drive home and pick up the shoes on the way to work. Instead, I casually strolled into the office in neatly pressed grey slacks, a sharp light blue business shirt with red and black checks and a matching pair of battered light blue shower thongs with the soles almost worn through. I didn't wear shoes for a few days after my debut Marathon last year due to blistered toes, so rest assured that my work colleagues have seen far worse! And besides, there was no way I was wasting 25 minutes in the car when I should be getting plenty of breakfast into me, quick smart! Nothing gets in the way of a good recovery!

Sunday 7/8 - Bridge to Brisbane Sunday Long Run

Sunday Long Run - 70 mins/15km's

A simply gorgeous Brisbane morning greeted 21,100 runners for the annual Bridge to Brisbane. My proper comeback race is the Noosa 5k in two weeks time, but that wasn't going to stop me participating in this event, which slowly continues to grow in stature, despite occasional organisational hiccups. I had planned to just enjoy a cruisey run with MJ but that went out the window last week when her back started playing up. So, I looked for a team mate who would be running splits around my normal Sunday Long Run pace and whom I could pace and settled on Chelle. I figured that given a multitude of injury problems of late, Chelle would be slightly short of her best and right on my pace. Wrong! Chelle ended up running a 10k PB on her way to a 56:20 and we went a little over 4.40's the whole way, but fortunately, my body was comfortable at that pace and I didn't over exert myself. Way to go, Chelle!! It could have been worse, however. I could have run with Tesso who had run 3 hours on Saturday AM and pre race, announced an intention to run an easy race in "around 4:45's". That didn't last too long as Tesso took off at speed and ran a blistering low 53 race - onya Champ!!

After the race, I excused myself from my team mates in the Recovery Area and did a bit of a loop back to my car for 17 minutes to complete the 70 minutes needed for my Sunday Long Run. Fortunately, its a Recovery Week on my program so I only needed to do 70 minutes instead of the 100 minutes I am currently peaking at. The Recovery Week has come as a big relief as my legs have been feeling the effects of some very fast recent speedwork and in particular, Tuesday's 3K Time Trial. Hopefully, the legs will be right to start firing again come Tuesday.

Chelle and I then stopped off at MJ's for a nice breakfast before I went to work. For dinner, MJ, my brother Adam and I all enjoyed a large and tasty rump cooked on the BBQ. I've really enjoyed a rump on the BBQ for many years, but its only very recently that I've started to get more scientific about the cooking of that perfect steak. By scientific, I mean cooking the steak according to a specific plan as opposed to looking for visual indicators such as the blood seeping through the surface. So, I strapped on my Timex brought the BBQ to maximum temperature in six minutes before easing it down to medium-high temperature for two minutes and then throwing on the pepper laced rump. I ended up cooking the rump for 4:30 minutes on the first side and 4:00 on the second and the medium to medium-well done result was satisfactory. In the meantime, to quote Lexus, I'll continue the relentless pursuit of perfection in the perfectly barbequed rump. Hhhmm, lets see - maybe I'll leave the BBQ on for 12 minutes next time and the rumps on for less? Whatever, I'll let you know when I've found the specifications for perfection, Matty style!!

Friday Blues

Friday Recovery Run - 40 mins, 8km's @ 5:02 per/km

Started the day by driving MJ to her physio at the Qld Sports Medicine Clinic at the Gabba. MJ's back had seized up following an innocous bend over whilst performing a CPR exercise at a training course yesterday. Watching her sprawled accross the back seat and grimacing as I tried to drive as smoothly as possible was a potent reminder that the Grim Reaper of injury is always lurking and looking to impede our windows of opportunity. I made a silent pact to really step up my core strengthening exercises which have fallen off the pace since I had my own back problems with trigger point pain from C5 in the spine a few months ago. Get well soon, MJ , you gutsy gal!!!

Was pretty lethargic most of the day and would like to have gone for my recovery run early in the morning to kick start my day with some feel good endorphins. However, where possible, I'm currently trying to keep at least 36hrs between my runs in order to give my shins maximum recovery time between sessions. So, at 4:30pm, I finally got out to my favourite route starting from the Nundah Criterium and following the bitumen path along the Kedron Brook. Racked up an easy 8k's and the body felt ok.

I can't sign off for the day without adding that Brett Lee's bowling was disgraceful last night and I've been saying for years that he's not up to test cricket. There! I feel better already for getting that off my chest!!

Sunday and Tuesday take their toll

6 x 500's - "ample" recovery.
500's/recovery - 95/57/98/65/107/37/107/54/110/36/107/end.
500's avg 104 secs/recovery avg 49.8 secs

By Tuesday night, I knew that the exertions of Sunday and the 3K TT had taken their toll, so I treated my body to a ten hour sleep and found time for some extra stretching on Wednesday. Alas, it was not enough and this morning I rocked up to speedwork with my legs suffering from a pretty fair case of Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness(DOMS). Still, its pretty normal for me not to "red line" it at the Thursday session after the monthly 3K TT and I was happy to resign myself to a solid hitout instead.

6 x 500's under the Story Bridge with "ample" recovery was on the program. As this is not a regular session, there was some banter about what Coach Pat's definition of "ample" would be with 30 secs being a popular tip. The cynics ended up with egg on their faces as Pat announced recoveries of around one minute.

I took out the first two reps a few secs behind my behind my normal pace in the low 90's before easing off. Finishing well behind the A-Team in the 500's and starting each new rep with them ensured that my recoveries were shortened allowing me a solid cardio hitout to make up for my slower running.

With Thursday being my day off, I went straight home and stood thigh deep in my icy cold pool for 15 minutes, penning entries in my diary whilst doing so. I'm a great believer in cold water wading recoveries, especially salt water and find that they really speed up my recovery from muscle soreness and/or prevent muscle soreness. A wading recovery is practically mandatory for me following any run over 90 minutes and any extremely hard speedwork session.

Pat Carroll Running Group 3K Time Trial - August

After the emotional high last Thursday of averaging a 3:19:75 PB for 4 x 1k reps on an average 58 second Standing Recovery(SR), I was wildy optimistic of breaking my 9:55 3K TT PB set on Melbourne Cup day last year, shortly before I broke down. However, come this morning, I knew there was a better than 50% chance that my 36k's on the bike on Sunday would take its toll. The enormity of taking a massive 30 seconds off last months lung busting 10:24 TT also sank in.

So, I took the rare step of setting a B goal of 10:10 but resolved to go out at 9:54 PB pace to see how the legs held up. On another perfect Winter morning, I bounced straight to the front and felt ok in clocking a 3:16 effort for the first k as Aaron drew alongside me and clocked an identical split. A small pack of Slash, Daniel, Aaron and myself then formed until the 1400m mark when my legs went dead and heavy - no mistaking the feeling - too much time on the bike on Sunday! At this point Daniel surged and Aaron responded immediately with the two proceeding to go hammer and tongs the rest of the way pushing each other under sub 10 with Aaron just pipping Daniel 9:52 to 9:54. Not far behind, Slash and I were in a duel of our own. We swapped the lead 3 times and managed to push each other to a PB for Slash and under my B goal time. Slash nudged ahead of me in the shadows of the Moreton Bay figs recording 10:04 to my 10:08. The beneficial effects of running closely to a team mate in a race or training cannot be underestimated. Slash probably ensured that I went 5 seconds faster than would have been the case if I was running solo. Hitting the line behind us was an "eyecatching" Phil K wearing the pink melon dress as punishment from Coach Pat for his sitting recovery during 1k's last Thursday - Being a past wearer of that infamous pink dress myself(voted the "honour" by my team mates) , my sympathy for Phil was non-existent!

So, I'm a satisfied man at the moment. I think I got everything there was out of myself today in clocking 3:16, 3:28 and 3:23 on the way to 10:08. Importantly, I've preserved my proud record of never doing one of my TT's slower than the previous month. I clocked 10:19, 10:05 and 9:55 in consecutive months last year. This year its 10:24 and now 10:08. History suggests I'll be ready for sub 10 next start!

Recovered from the session with a wading recovery in thigh deep water at South Bank's Breaka Beach before bouncing into the office with far too much enthusiasm and vigour for some of my colleagues to handle :-)

Volunteering - Park to Park, Ipswich, Sun 31/7

It was a HUUUUGE weekend. I enjoyed a Saturday night at the Broncos with MJ, team mate Chelle and her boyfriend Shane along with the usual suspects in attendance. A nice come from behind win by the Broncs despite not quite playing our best continued to establish the team's premiership credentials.

An obscenely short four hours sleep followed before I got up at 2:55 am on Sunday AM and drove out to Limestone Park at Ipswich to help set up the course for the inagural Park to Park Half Marathon/10k/5k. Fortunately I heeded my mate RooBoy's advice to keep all the car doors locked when driving through Ipswich as I had 4 drunks run out at the car in the middle of the road when I was doing 50km's per hour! And there were two paddy wagons waiting for the inevitable arrests outside Players Nightclub when I drove through the main street. Aaah, Ipswich - it hasn't changed at all!!!

Course set up proceeded relatively smoothly compared with some of my past experiences at this activity and then I spent the duration of the 3 races assuming the role of lead bike after the original volunteer failed to show. This involved riding 36k's in total and lots of hills, probably about 5k worth when I really had to dig into the pedals to get up. After not being on the bike for a few months, hopefully the DOMS from this activity won't curtail my aspirations of a fast 3K TT on Tuesday morning. Still it was a great experience being lead bike, particularly in the Half when I led this years Gold Coast 10k winner, Chris Reeves around the course. What a runner! Afterward, I put on my journo's cap and proceeded to interview the Half winners, Reeves and Helen Stanton for the Race Reports I am compiling for the new Run For Your Life magazine. It was a treat to pick the brains of these elite runners and get a feel for their mindsets. I've still got a lot to learn about interviewing techniques but I think I've made progress in my short time in this game. My shorthand definitely needs a lot of work though!

So, on four hours sleep, a woeful food intake and 36k's on the bike, it stands to reason that I might have struggled a little with my Sunday long run after getting home from Ippy, right? Wrong! I got out to the Nundah Criterium around 11:30am and set off along the path next to the Kedron Brook in warm 25 degrees plus weather, wearing sunscreen for the first time in a while. From the word go, I settled into a comfortable and relaxed rythm of low 4:40 k's which didn't let up even when I finally started to bonk with 15 minutes to go. The end result: 100mins of running for 21k's at 4:42 k's. I want to stress that I was not pushing it hard and was really surprised that I was running 10 secs faster than my usual low 4:50's long run pace. Who know's why I ran so well? Perhaps it was:
a) The hard work with my glute firing exercises starting to pay dividends?
b) The new Brooks Glycerin 4's I was wearing?
c) My body was really warmed up after a morning of vigorous activity?
d) I'd accidentally swapped my watch with the one Coach Pat uses when 60 sec Standing Recoveries mysteriously become 50 secs?

Anyway, a shift at work followed and it was a pleasure to hit the sack genuinely exhausted after getting the most out of the day!