Sunday 18/10/09
Lucky if I got 3hrs sleep last night between a late phone call, the rain and extraordinarily painful neck. In the end I took some painkillers at 3am and woke when the alarm went off at 4am.
Up, dressed, packed and on the train to Dapto by 5am where a friend (Bike boy) picked me up and took me to his place for pre-run toast and then chaffeured me to Mt Kembla for the Orchard Run.
My first Kembla Joggers Mountain series run and I was a little nervous. We were early so drove a bit of the course before the others arrived.
Pipi gave us a pre run briefing – 10k out and back then back out to a dog leg up a hill that bike boy reckoned was near impossible to ride a mountain bike up and back to the start again. Then, with a 1, 2, 3 go, we were off. A very small field with Bethany and myself the only females. I knew I’d be last (I hate that!) but concentrated on not letting too massive a gap open between myself and the man in front of me (ah, vanity!)
The first 10k were rolling hills out and back, starting with a long uphill so finishing with a nice long downhill. A bit of vanity fartlek as the others passed me on their way back meant i ran strongly on a long, slight incline to the turnaround and gained a bit on the guy in front, who was about 500m ahead at the turnaround.
Mysteriously there were more uphill sections on the way back than I remember downhills on the way out. Hmmmm how does that work?
Powered down the downhill to the start and headed back up the hill to the dogleg. I was averaging 7.08/km till heading back out. Stumbled over the gate and up the nastiest mother of a hill I’ve seen since Bhutan. Pace slowed to 13min/km and I felt like I was crawling! Calves and lungs burning as I slowly walked up.
Bethany and the others gave me encouragement as they headed off to finish and eventually I spotted the guy ahead of me as he came towards me on his way back. He surprised me by saying “you’ve gained on me! Not far now…just around the corner”. I picked up the pace till I saw what was just around the corner…the flags, yes but also a nasty kick in the incline.
Focussed on the flags and powered up (ahem) and then yeay the turnaround and yikes! How the hell do I run down that?
Practising my downhill form I nearly tripped on a stick and freaked myself out. Picked my way fairly gingerly to where the decline was more forgiving and tried again. My legs weren’t able to keep up the turnover speed and I nearly tripped again so resolved to the ungainly and torturous braking style I’d long abandoned.
Safely on the road again I opened up and ran with that wonderful effortless feeling of a nice downhill run. Felt like I was flying. Looking at the Garmin, I wasn’t! But it felt like I was.
I had the total distance as 12.49km so it was either short or my Garmin was packing a sad. Average pace 8.03/km. 1 hr 40mins on my feet.
Good fun 
