It's all been happening!

I have to go by memory this week as I no longer have a Garmin stick to download my week’s runs. I had everything written in draft on my little laptop but unfortunately on Tuesday we had a break-in and our house was burgled. One of the losses was my lovely little laptop with my Garmin stick attached although they didn’t take my Garmin which was charging nearby. All the history of my runs and my photos are on that laptop which is very frustrating.

I think home invaders are the scum of the earth. The fear and loss of trust that has been installed in me is worse than the theft. I jump at every noise and no longer feel comfortable at home on my own. I guess I am very lucky that I have lived nearly 61 years and this is the first time we have been burgled. We are also lucky that nobody has been hurt and Teddy is still here, as the side fencing had been moved and he could easily have run away. Instead he remained as a faithful “watch” dog, no doubt happily “watching” as the burglers trashed our bedroom and removed anything of value that they could find! If only dogs could talk!

The most inconvenient part of all this is that we leave for Spain on 30 May and all our passports (five current ones between us) and relevant documentation was in a steel safe which has been pulled from the wall and removed. We are now in the process of having new passports organised and old ones cancelled - such a pain!

Anyway, back to what I can remember of the week just gone.

Saturday 7 May
Andy and I ran from the War Memorial at 8.45am and just ran for 15 minutes before returning to meet Ewen at 9am and from there running to the ferry terminal where we met Emma and a little later speedy Geoff. It was a cold crisp morning but the sun shone and it was a good run once we got into our stride. We ran through the ANU grounds, which are always interesting, and back to the War Memorial.
Total distance: 20km
We tried a new venue for coffee today at Wilburs by the Hackett Shops. It was quite a pleasant change except that it was very cold outside and we needed extra layers.

Sunday 8 May
I took Teddy with me on my run during a sunny part of the day.
Total distance: 8km
Time taken: 50mins

Monday 9 May
In the morning I went to the gym and spent a couple of hours doing upper body strength work. At 5.30pm I joined the speedy geese for our training session at Parliament House. After our warm up loops we headed for the hilly grassy bank opposite PH. Our main session consisted of 12 x 100m hill sprints on 90secs followed by attrition sprints won by Joel who was narrowly followed by Colin and Abby. We then ran a warm down loop in and out of the trails round PH.
Total distance: 8km

Tuesday 10 May
Due to the circumstances described at the start of this blog entry I didn’t manage a run today. The house was no longer secure as the door needed repairing and I even had to miss out on the speedygeese dinner that night which was very disappointing!

Wednesday 11 May
Fortunately the insurance company sent a builder to secure the door and although it still needed a replacement lock I was able to join Ewen at Parliament House for a warm up (?) run at 5.30pm before Chris and Andy joined us for our usual run. I have to say that it was great to get out but oh boy, it was a cold night. I wore leggings, gloves, long sleeved top and tee shirt and never felt it was too hot. I did remove the spray jacket that I had worn on the warm up. Gee, it was minus 2deg and it felt very cold indeed!
Total distance: 10.2km
Time taken: 63mins
Average pace per km: 6:16

Thursday 12 May
Tonight I arrived at the speedy geese session at Dickson Oval just a little late and missed the first warm up lap. I was greeted with lots of hugs and felt so loved. I do think it makes a huge difference to know that people are so caring. I have wonderful friends. Everyone has been so supportive and this does help so much.
After another warm up loop of the oval our main session was a pyramid type session round the track.

60secs fast/60 jog
50secs fast/50 jog
40secs fast/40 jog
30secs fast/30 jog
40secs fast/40 jog
50secs fast/50 jog
60secs fast/60 jog

This was repeated for 20minutes with speedycoach blowing the whistle at the appropriate changes of speed. It was tough but enjoyable. I was lucky to have the company of speedygosling Jeni for the entire run.
We finished with a warm down lap of the oval and didn’t wait around too long afterwards as the air was very cold indeed!
Total distance: 6.5km (a short session as I missed the long warm up at the start)

Friday 13 May
Today was my rest day but I did go to the gym at 6.15am for an intensive RPM/spin session. This was followed by a remedial massage and oh boy I have a lot of very sore touchy spots right now. Tomorrow is only a middle distance run, a week before the half marathon.

Saturday 14 May
Today only two of us left the War Memorial at 9am for my last longish run before the half marathon next Sunday. Ewen and I wore our long sleeved tops on a crisp but sunny morning of only 5deg as we ran along Anzac Parade to the lake, along Kings Ave, the south side of the lake past Lotus Bay, over Commonwealth Bridge and back to the War Memorial. It was relaxing and we enjoyed good conversation which continued when we were joined for coffee by Liz and CJ at the War Memorial café later.
Total distance: 15km
Time taken: 1:36:48
Average pace per km: 6:27

Sunday 15 May
This afternoon I took Teddy with me as it was a scheduled easy run. After a couple of early distractions he ran quite well veering off and pulling me with him when he spotted another dog to bark at but apart from that we enjoyed a good run. He’s improving!
Total distance: 8km
Time taken: 48:55 (Teddy will make the 6min per km mark yet!)