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Running Inspiration

Cands — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 14:06:20 +0000

A friend of mine sent me this the other day and it has inspired me to think about planning my own little endurance race. I’d probably not do something as crazy as running across the Sahara, but something which has a good mix of stamina, fun, endurance and excitement might actually be exactly what I can occupy my free time with… Feel free to give me some ideas

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I’m back!!!

Cands — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 13:44:16 +0000

Yes, I took some time off running and blogging after the Comrades because let’s face it, we all know what it’s like when you are working towards something and it ends up taking over all your headspace - you end up needing some time off from what you were working on and just taking a breather – which is what I’ve been doing. No running and no writing about running, it’s been marvelous!!

Anyway I’m now back on the wagon because you do reach a stage where you miss whatever you were working on and want go back to it – or a variation thereof. Since seconding my mom at the African X, I have been seriously reconsidering the world of trail running. You might remember my first attempts at trail running which ended in me vowing never again to set foot on an un-paved path – but it just looks like so much fun so I decided to give it another shot…

To ease me back into it I signed up for the Montrail/Cape Storm trail running series again – the first of which was yesterday. I managed to provoke, encourage and threaten a couple of my friends to do it too so my experience of the race was totally different to last year because I actually had people to run the whole way with. I also put no pressure on myself to do the 10km route in an hour, like I’m used to on the road, which meant that we could walk the difficult bits and totally eliminated the stress.

I’m not going to trade my running shoes in just yet for trail shoes, but I’m pretty enthusiastic about my future in trail running – and it doesn’t even have anything to do with the fact that the average age of the trail running fraternity is roughly half that of road runners

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Comrades 2010 – Race Dissection

Cands — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 14:18:37 +0000

3:45am Sunday
My alarm goes off and I stagger out of bed to put my running kit on, have breakfast and prepare myself for the long day ahead.

5:15am
I’m standing in a crowd 23,000 people strong, along with Craig (my running partner from last year) and his mom Linda listening to Chariots of Fire and feeding off the energy only this many people can give off at the start of a race which is said to ‘define you’.

5:30am
The cannon goes off and it takes 10 minutes to get over the start line, this could be a problem considering that the race is timed from gun to gun, not on your actual time from your chip.

6:30am
I join the sub-11 hour bus and hang on, looking for Craig who got lost in the mayhem at the start. I happen to find Julie and we catch up on the last few weeks.

7:30am
I find Craig and we try to keep up with the sub-11 hour bus and fall off when we stop at my dad for food. We decide to just take the race as it comes, enjoying the experience for what it is and not stressing about coming in at a certain time, other than just to finish within 12 hours – which we would have comfortably.

11:04am
We go through half-way. We are tired and still seem to be running UP on a DOWN run…

12:00am
I lose my sense of humour and then get it back once the Myprodol kicks in. Craig and Julie are going strong although also on the grumpy side. The supporters help us along, screaming and shouting for us by name.

14:20pm
We are 18km from the end and the downhills are testing our quads and already dead tired legs. We have picked up one of my team mates along the way who isn’t feeling great. The sub-11 hour bus is nowhere to be seen.

15:40pm
We are 10km from the end and decide that we would like a bronze and not a copper medal so we need to do the last 10km in an hour. All the literature says that you need 80min for the last 10km but we decide to push anyway.

16:00pm
We are running hard into Durban. We see the first sub-11 hour bus and pass it. We are going faster now than in any other time during the race.

16:20
We catch and pass the second sub-11 hour bus, the one we were meant to be on. Before they fill the road around a bend, we take them on the outside and zoom past - into the last 2km of the race. I’m feeling like my legs want to pop off, Julie wants to throw-up and Craig is just hell-bent on getting to the end before 11 hours.

16:40
We enter the stadium. I get goosebumps from everyone screaming our names. We cross the finish line at 10 hours and 52 minutes, hand-in-hand. We ran the last 10km in 42 minutes – that is after we had run 79km!! And again I am convinced that you can do ANYTHING you put your mind to.

I had an amazing time once again, thanks to Craig and Julie for sticking it out with me I hope all of you that ran had a great run and enjoyed it for what it is – The Ultimate Human Challenge!! Let me know how you did.

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My Comrades 2010 Running Plan

Cands — Sat, 29 May 2010 10:00:02 +0000

My plan for every Comrades thus far has been simple – I just want to finish… The first time I did it I started with my mom and then ended up running alone from about half-way, I had my iPod to keep me company but running alone can be tough. Last year I had Craig and we ran in the sub-11 hour bus, it was MUCH better than running alone because Stuart our ‘bus driver’ was incredibly inspirational and kept up going, along with the fact that you feel part of a whole which makes it a bit easier when you are feeling tired and sore.

This year I will be joining the sub-11 hour bus again and I would advise all the novices out there who are already having sleepless nights, to stick to whichever bus is within your ability. A group means you have support and the energy within each bus is easy to draw off of – that is of course besides the fact that you don’t have to worry about how fast or how slow you are going. The bus will get you into the stadium and over the line in exactly what they advertise to do (ie if its the sub-11 hour bus they will get you in just before 11 hours and the same with the others).

Last year there were two sub-11 hour busses, I’m not sure what this year has in store for us but if I find out I will let you know here – and if you are in the sub-11 hour bus and you see a girl running in a skirt with pink socks, then say hi!!

Photo Credit

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Running your mind into submission

Cands — Fri, 28 May 2010 06:00:37 +0000

In my post about the Psychology of Running I told you what I do in terms of keeping control of my mind and my thoughts during an endurance event like the Comrades Marathon. I also said that I have a little energy exercise which I do when it feels like my wheels are about to fall off, and here it is…

Note: This may seem a bit airy-fairy and hippy but I use it all the time and it works like a charm!

The aim with this exercise is to draw on energy which is all around us, for our own use. This energy is essentially ripe for the picking, we just need to access it and the easiest way is to think of those things which inspire us and make us happy. The way I do this is through the recollection of incredible things which I have experienced. The way our brain stores our memories is to attach an emotion to the event before it is filed away as a memory – so in recalling certain events you have the ability to experience the accompanying emotion along with it.

To start this exercise, I cast my mind back to every incredibly moment in my life, things like your first kiss (although for some of us that is WAY to far gone), your wedding day, the day your child was born, your first Comrades finish, travel – whatever makes you feel good and can feel a physical response to.

Then you need to imagine the emotion of those memories as light which collects in an inward spiral in your solar plexis or just below your ribs, basically where you would feel what we call ‘butterflies’ if you are nervous. You need to imagine these emotions coming together to form a ball of energy (I usually imagine it being white or pale yellow) which is so tightly bound that it is reflecting intense light outwards from the centre of your body. Now you can feed off this ball of energy whenever you need to. You will probably find that in this process you will feel the hairs raise on your arms and you might even get goosebumps without it being cold – I have had it where it even feels like my hair is raising off my head like there is intense static electricity nearby.

I do this exercise before I get up on race morning so that my ‘ball of energy’ is already there for me to draw on. The nature of energy is that it never dissapears, it just changes form so if you feel like your ball of light is looking a bit dull then all you do is conjure up those memories again, even things which didn’t happen but you know would make you feel good if they did – like maybe being the first to run into the stadium at the Comrades, or helping someone who is battling accross the finish line, or kissing Brad Pitt (oh dear, did I just say that out loud?).

If you use this during the race on Sunday, let me know how it goes – I’d be really interested to see how it works in other people.

Photo Credit

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Comrades 2010 – Keeping Track

Cands — Thu, 27 May 2010 13:27:19 +0000

Just 3 days until 20 500 runners take to the streets of Pietermaritzburg, and make their way down to Durban. If you are an avid fan who will be watching SABC 2 from 5am on Sunday, keeping your eyes peeled for anyone you know who may be running, then good for you!! If you have some friends running but have better things to do on Sunday then you shall be forgiven, but let this go down in the annals of history – that you had other things to do while WE ran flor whatever cause (our own included

There are ways in which you can actually be updated with your runners progress throughout the day! If you SMS the race number of the runner concerned to 38132, you will get an update of the runners time and where on the course they are at that stage, sent right to your phone. These SMS’ cost R10 of which most of it goes to charity.

If you would like to keep track of me, my race number is 43099. For those of you who need more details you can call my dad (aka Worlds Best Second) or you can leave me a message on my phone and I’ll call you back when I’m done. I will hopefully have someone updating my Twitter account with my times if anyone prefers that medium of communication

I think that covers it…

Photo Credit

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The Psychology of Running

Cands — Tue, 25 May 2010 15:00:35 +0000

With the Comrades less than a week away, I have had a fair share of people asking me how I manage to run for so long (around 10 – 12 hours) and so far (89km), so I thought I’d share what goes through, or more accurately what doesn’t go through my mind during this race…

The biggest thing about being able to do endurance events is how well you are able to get into the ‘zone’ or to the point where you body is doing what it needs to do automatically, and the mind is still. You need to stop all the doubt and frustration going through your mind because I believe this is the factor which determines whether you have a good race or not.

I have said this before and I’m going to say it again, this is just one day! One day of pain and fear and exhaustion, but just a day, not a week or a month or a lifetime.

Pre-Race

Before the race I try and stay as calm as possible. It is very easy to get caught up in the mayhem at the start and it is also very common to feed off the nervous excitement and anxiety of other runners. I try and block all of this out and focus on the fact that I am standing at the start of the oldest Ultra Marathon in the World and the fact that I am finally at the point where all my months of hard work are going to pay off. I try and stop negative thoughts before they have even had a chance to bloom and gain momentum. I would suggest basking in ‘Chariots of Fire’ and the fact that you have loved ones watching from all corners of the country. It is too late at this stage to stress about the training you didn’t do, focus on what you did and trust in your power of will.

During the Race

The way I see it is that to get through the day, you have to become pretty damn good at ignoring what is going on in your head. Your legs will be sore, your feet will be aching and there will be various other aches and pains which will occupy your mind – if you let it. It basically becomes a battle between you and that noise in your head (mind). My first line of defence is usually to find someone to speak to – this distracts your mind from focusing on what is sore and other negative thoughts by concentrating on someone else. If there is nobody in sight I will put my iPod in and crank it up depending on how much my mind is protesting.

If this doesn’t work, and there is usually a couple of points in the race where you will need to step it up a notch in running your mind into submission – this is where I will try and connect with my senses which shuts the discursive mind (that part of your mind which is making a noise) right up. A simple running through of your senses, from feeling your feet in your shoes and your clothes on your body, taste, smell and sight to hearing your heartbeat and the sound of the footfalls of runners around you. This does wonders in reconnecting you with that part within which is capable of anything.

As you run into the stadium

You need to remember to be totally focused as you run into the stadium at the end. You need to enjoy and remember what it is like to run into a stadium where thousands of people are shouting for you because YOU have just run 89km, you need to be with it enough to plant this memory into your brain, although I must warn you, it is usually due to this feeling at the end which makes people do this race again and again

I have a little energy exercise I also do when I’m REALLY feeling like I might lose the battle with the noise in my head, but that is for another post.

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Running in Pink…

Cands — Mon, 24 May 2010 15:00:34 +0000

Boobs, breasts, numbies, jugs, tits, udders – we all have different names for those two mounds on every woman’s chest. They are regularly spoken about in the running world because for some women, restraining them can be a bit of a mission – luckily I don’t have that problem, my pre-pubescent boy’s body makes sure there is no movement on my chest area – ever! Sport’s bra, running bra and over-shoulder-boulder-holders are hotly contested subjects on forums and blogs and that is just in the running world!! I’m not even going to delve into the dark underworld of the mans mind when it comes to mammary glands.

Either way there is one thing which is guaranteed, you either have breasts of your own, have access to breasts and have almost certainly suckled on breasts in your lifetime – so just imagine finding out that these sometimes flattering, sometimes the object of your lust are effectively the cause of your sickness or even death… I know its a less than savory subject to talk about, but it is for just this reason that there are so many women out there that are uneducated on the seriousness of this disease, which can be checked for and any irregularity found early on and treated.

The Pink Drive aims to educate women and provide mobile mammogram units to those who either don’t have access to medical facilities or who have never thought to have lumps in their breasts checked. This campaign is vitally important if we are going to keep the women behind each set of breasts alive and well to keep caring and nurturing the generations to come.

So, if you would like to show your support then go to my Pink Drive tab and donate some money – then comment on my blog, my wall on Facebook or send me an email so that I know who to think about while I run the 89km from Pietermaritzburg to Durban on May 30th, clad in pink!!

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Running Photos

Cands — Fri, 21 May 2010 07:00:14 +0000

Yesterday I was notified that my pictures from the Two Oceans had been uploaded to Action Photo – these are the official photographers at all of our races and you can buy your pictures online after the race if you want them.

It is always great to have a photo to remember your race by, well the big ones anyway, but most of the time they are not all that flattering. In my Two Oceans pics Jason, my running buddy, looked like he wanted to punch someone in every single one (on asking him about this he did confess to wanting to punch himself) which made me think about the letter I wrote to these running photographers, trying to give them pointers as to when they should and shouldn’t take a photo and the warning signs of when we are about to be consumed by running rage.

Have a look at that letter and if you know anyone who is a running photographer then please pass it on, its time we started educating these guys.

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Comrades Marathon Course Route

Cands — Wed, 19 May 2010 12:30:28 +0000

For those of you who haven’t seen the course route, this video goes through it all along with the profile. Listen when he says that although this is a ‘down run’ there are still many uphills!! If you would rather ostrich this then that is fine with me, just skip this video

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