Thursday, May 17, 2007

A vision splendid

This coming Sunday, I'll be running the Sydney Morning Herald Half Marathon in a Susanesque state of preparedness. My panic is due to falling in love. Actually, that should be 'back in love' – with racing. Falling head over heels has led me to neglect the long training runs.

I've commenced a plan to race, pretty much weekly, over the winter. There have been three recent affairs: A 6km cross country run (28:54), the Nail Can Hill Run and a 5km road race last Saturday (22:34).

Nail Can Hill was on Sunday 6 May. I like that race. It's like a mini Six Foot. It has a great vibe at the start with 1200-plus runners setting out on an 11.3k point-to-point journey. It has a hill – 2km up instead of 8.5km. It has a great fire trail through the Aussie bush. It has a thrilling and fast descent to a long finish chute, well supported by spectators. I had a goal this year of running 56 minutes, but finished in 59:17. Nevertheless, it was a great fun day, helped by perfect weather.

On Sunday I'm hoping for a similarly enjoyable experience, this time, as Clancy would say; "in the gritty of the dusty dirty city, rather than with a vision splendid of sunlit plains extended". Good luck to my CoolRunning and blogging friends who are running. See you at the start!

18 comments:

Shane said...

Good luck Ewen, I hope you do well and look forward to the race report.

I lived in Wodonga for about 2 years and regretably never ran the nail can run. I think I went into hibernation around this time of year down there. Good time though I have rode my MTB aroud the area a few times and it would be a tough run.

Anonymous said...

See you on Sunday Ewen - and welcome to the underdone club ;-)

Tesso said...

Hope your love story has a happy ending on Sunday :-)

Stephen Lacey said...

And good luck to you too my warm and furry friend. Sounds like somebody has got their mojo back.

Superflake said...

Good luck on Sunday Ewen. Hopefully we'll catch up on the start line or after.

Simlin said...

I'll see you at the finish for that six-pack ;)

TA and the Gnome said...

Hope to see you at the start, but if not, then at the bottom of Argyle St. Race well! :-)

Gnome

2P said...

Break a leg Ewen - I look forward to the report.

strewth said...

You got me on the second sentence - here's hoping this "affair" is not too painful! Have a fantastic run on Sunday in Sydney. I'm looking forward to reading all about it and perhaps catching up at least on the warm-up loop on Monday! Oh and slightly underdone is usually much better than overdone!

Stu Mac said...

All the best for this weekend, I'm sure experience will get through for a decent one!

Anonymous said...

Have a fantastic run, try not to stop in at Lindt for a hoc choccie until afterwards.

Robert Song said...

Looking at your Ks done in the first part of the year, you should have a good base to work from for a racing season. Go for it.

For a for seconds there I thought your hope from your 50th birthday post had come true and a marriage was on the way.

Samurai Running said...

No Robert, Ewen might be a touched/crazy/insane trail runner but he's not stupid.

Bruce said...

Have a good race mate. Thanks for the tips on the aqua jogging too. Sounds like I need to stick at it some more.

Anonymous said...

i hope your love story plays otu with gratuitous fartlek scenes.

Toasty said...

And the bush hath friends to meet him, and their kindly voices greet him

Spark Driver said...

Looking forward to your race report. Hope it all went well?

Tesso said...

Re State of Origin - as Connie Francis would say "Who's sorry now" :-)