August done

Roll on Spring is all I can say!   Last day of the month and thought I'd sneak another short run in tonight after work.  Very short I had things to do.

Grand total for August ... 117.81km  Ta daaaaah!

Thought I'd try one of these shots that my friend Leah is very good at, except my belly kept getting in the way! ha.

Mission accomplished.  What's next I hear you ask?  You did ask, didn't you?

The 12wbt Runners Connect have a #SIIS challenge (Smash it in September).  Write down your goals for the month and work towards them.  No excuses.  

Last longest run before HM

Two weeks out and this weekend was to be my longest training run before the half marathon.  And truly the adage get it done and get it over with rings true for sure.  Yesterday when I ran it was 1 degree Celsius when I left the house, brrrr.  It was a long tight two shirt kind of run.  There was a little bit of misty rain interspersed with a bit of sun later on.   But today however, it was raining this morning, soaking rain.   Soooo glad I did this run on Saturday!  Whew.

I am getting bored with running round and round town here, or out and back on the long country roads as the kms rise, so I sat with Google maps and plotted out a new route, half of which I'd never run before, let alone drove down.   What a lovely run down some beautiful country roads.

I started my live Garmin tracker for hubby who was still in bed and off I went, so he would know where I was.

Whew it was a long one.  18.47km.  Yes yes I know, why didn't I run that extra .03.  Don't ask me.  All I remember was thinking I had gotten back to the car, I had done my 18.  Finished !

And with that I also accomplished my run 100km for August.   So happy, probably still one more short run in me tomorrow night.    Photo down Dalvui Lane looking across to Mt. Noorat, love the old stone fences, they are a work of art, even as they are crumbling.

Almost Spring, roll on Tuesday.  I am soooooo over this winter, it's been a shocker.  Ready to set some September goals, one of which is the #SIIS  (smash it in September) that the 12wbt Runners Connect group are on board with.  Set your goals and achieve them.  Watch this space.

My Mt Everest Run

Okay so I have this blogger-turned-real-life friend Cat who is an amazing runner.  And she put so much into perspective for me today and I thank her very much for that.  I had posted on facebook about my run today and there were some high fiving well wishes and I felt like a fraud.  I may have run (let's be honest, run-walk-run) 16.6km, but I was slow.  It was misty rain the whole way.  I stopped for some photos of cows.  And I mentioned when reading the comments not to get too excited as it was slow today.   An the amazing Cat retorts with:  "Stop with the slow!!  No one asks you how fast you climb Everest!!!!!"    I shared that comment with our 12wbt Runners Connect online group and it resonated with a number of those girls too.  So thank you wise Cat.

So as mentioned I needed a decent run today so to do something different I drove over to Terang and parked my car and ran back to Noorat (a town about 6km away) and then back to Terang and then a lap of the dry lake.    It was what I set out to do and I did it.  Was quite soaked by the time I finished, and starving, and oh so bad chafing under my right arm.  In the end as I was running I was holding that arm out like a wing, no wonder the cows were laughing at me!   I think because I was wet it was rubbing on my shirt, you know the flabby jelly under arm bit! ha.

Anyway so here's my very impressive map.

It's a good run as there's a walking/riding path the whole way, so you're not on the road at all.  There was a lot of long straight bits like this.

And many curious audience participation members lining up at fences like this.   They weren't shy at all.

Love that the cow is the official-unofficial-who knows- mascot of our 12wbt Runners Connect group.   We all try to get a cow photo each week on our runs, makes it hard for the city dwellers, but they've been quite inspirational finding all forms of cows as well! 

And in my quest to run 100km this August I'm up to 88.02 !  Only 12 to go with 9 days still to run.  Yeeeeeha!   Don't you love the eyes on the cow on the left, I wonder what she is thinking!

This is how ridiculous it looked as I was running, I did one of those panorama shots so it's a bit out of skew, but the cow whisperer sure has it, they all lined up along the whole length of the paddock to moo me on to victory!

Early night for this chick.  Hope your Sunday is a good one.

A rare sunny Winter's day

After suffering through the iciest winter I can remember in years, yesterday's run with the Warrnie Athletics Club was one out of the box.  The weather was beautiful!!!! To be honest I can't remember the last time I ran in a sleeveless top!  Is this the first sign of things to come?  Cross fingers.

It was a 10km and as usual I was first cab off the rank being they use a handicapped system and let's face it ... I'm slow!!  I kept a keen eye out for the orange chalk arrows so I knew where I was heading.  A peril obviously that fast runners face all the time being the front runners, but in our handicap system something I still get uneasy about.

The route this time took us from the club rooms down to past The Flume back to Thunder Point.  I didn't even know there were pathways across there only ever having driven up to Thunder Point before.  The view along the pathway was magnificent.  I got to 3km before the first runner past me.  Then slowly the avalanche comes!  Everyone so encouraging, calling out 'great job' or 'keep it up'.  Best thing I've done for myself is join up the Winter Series.

How beautiful is this view I got to see while running.  Superb!

No gel required.  Goodness what the heck was happening here I'll never know.  It wasn't windy, only a slight breeze.  Looks like I'm going for a Mohawk.

I was last back at the club rooms and dear Kellie ran the lap of the oval with me.  Here's Alison, Kellie and I at the end.  Love the new club shirts, I needed to exchange my size so will be able to wear it next time.

The club put on pizza and drinks afterwards being that this was an afternoon run.  It was a great afternoon.

So countdown is on till my next half marathon.  Koroit to Warrnambool on 13 September!  Hopefully it will be happy birthday to me!! ;-)

Mosaic 2 Mountain

Race recap only a week late!  

So last Sunday was the Mosaic 2 Mountain in Dunkeld.  I'd been checking the weather app from about 10 days out daily.  Oh okay I checked twice a day!!!! The temp seemed to be dropping.  

I decided the day before I would be wearing long tights, double layer (long tshirt topped by short tshirt), hat (in case of rain) and gloves would be a definite addition.  They could be taken off and hooked into my spibelt if necessary, but as it happened I wore them the entire 10km.

I was to meet my good running buddy Chloe who would be coming from a couple of hours north and we planned to have a great time.

As I got closer to Dunkeld I couldn't even see the mountains they were shrouded in low lying cloud.   Finally they appeared as beautiful as ever.  I know I've mentioned many times I adore The Grampians.

It was good fortune this year that they had the conference room at the Royal Mail to check in and hang out in the warm before the run started.  Not long after I got there Chloe arrived.  Yay let the fun begin!   Hey Mt Sturgeon has done its disappearing act again!!

So time came to head out I checked the weather.  I announced it was "6 degrees feels like 2" and I swear if nearby people had something in their hands they would have thrown it at me!

Earlier that morning the 21km race and the 26km race to the top of the Mount had already commenced.  My super running friend Matilda from Run Mum blog was doing that but I missed the start of those races.

Finally came time for the 10km.  Off we started.  It was all about enjoying the moment, we talked almost non stop!  

Action shot!!!  Excuse the blur (maybe we were running too fast!!! Ha).   We headed out towards Mt Abrupt towering ahead of us with Mt Sturgeon to our left.  Then as we turned it was as if we were heading directly to Mt Sturgeon, just beautiful.

As we were running we were amongst the last runners and the sweeper bike rider came upon us.  What pressure!  We kept telling him to stop and talk to the people at turning points.  Then I threatened to start talking girl talk if he didn't leave us alone. Ha.

We finished and I saw Matilda as I crossed the line for a hug!  I didn't even think to grab a pic and went back later but couldn't find her :-(. Where did you go Matilda!!!! There was some fruit and bottles of water at the finish and some very welcome and delicious soup put on by the kinder ladies.  

The presentations weren't until 12 and being that there was that lovely warm conference room to hang out in, we found not many people left but instead hung out, it was nice.   They had two young chaps with guitars singing to entertain, another table of fruit and oat slices.  A lady doing massages and a display from Athletes Foot and Steigan Socks.  And they had a computer hooked up to the timing if we wanted to get our official time there and then.  A couple of darling little kinder boys were checking out random bib numbers as people were milling around and would appear in front of you with a "here you are" and hand us a docket with our race details and time.  Too cute.

The majority of the big runners came in and presentations started, many spot prizes given out, it was a really well organised event.  Kudos to the kinder, that was the third year I'd done it, and it gets better every year.  Really enjoyed the different route and direction this year too.

So there you have it.  It's a wrap.