Essential Marathon Preparation: The Long Run - Part 2

I just went on a 16 km run around Massey and West Harbour, the same course that I did last Saturday. This time it took 91 mins, with some walking in between. That is an improvement of 5 minutes. Around the 10km mark, I was doing around 6 mins/km, then the last 6 kms I increased the pace to 5 mins/km, which is quite encouraging. I think the muscles were used to the strain of running that it was able to take on more strain without dramatic fatigue.

And I haven't got sick yet, which is great since I was battling the elements on my last long run. Next Saturday, I'll increase the distance to 20km, slightly shorter than half marathon distance, and see if I can do that in under 2 hours. Now that would be fantastic.

Threads

I found myself on a loose end with Threads today at work. It was just awful struggling my way through Thread concepts, which I should have a solid understanding on. Everything that I learned about Threads were just defenestrated; it was horrible.

My team leader basically had to write the code for me..... definitely not a good look with the performance reviews coming along next week.

Oh well, glad it's Friday. In my spare time, I will resolve to brush up on Thread concepts.

Essential Marathon Preparation: The Long Run

Yesterday I took went on a 16 km run around Massey and West Harbour. It took me 96 mins to do, with bits of walking in between in order to have a swig of water. Overall that is 6 mins/km, which is what I want my marathon pace to be. The next step is to increase the distance slowly week by week, to build the endurance necessary to run 42 km at that marathon pace, and maybe speed up my marathon pace to 5 mins/km.

Near the end of my run, the rain started pouring down. Since I wore my thermals, a t-shirt and a jacket I wasn't totally soaked. However I think I'll have to wear a waterproof jacket instead when running.

I hope that I don't catch a cold from training in cold and wet conditions, reason being that it's a bad idea to train while you are sick, and my throat seems a bit scratchy. Might come down with a sore throat in a couple of days......

I also started buying protein supplements as well. The idea behind this is to boost recovery after exercise so that you can train intensely without wearing yourself down. Exercise damages the body, it is only through recovery that the body gets better and stronger. Overtraining without a sufficient recovery period is also bad for the body.

Mortality and the Hourglass

My next-door neighbour had suffered a tragedy. The eldest daughter, Olivia, suddenly passed away last night at a very young age.

Me being 26 at the time of writing this, passing away at an age very close to mine made me seriously think about my own mortality. I value life dearly and have recently taken personal steps to improve my physical life, to delay my mortality which comes through the process of aging.

A nice metaphor to illustrate this is the hourglass. People are hourglasses. From the moment people are born into the world, their hourglass has only just started pouring their life sand at a constant trickle.

Some people are big hourglasses, some are small. Some people's hourglasses take 90 years to finish, others take only a few minutes. But at the end of the day, the life sands of one's own hourglass will eventually run out, sometimes unexpectedly.

No matter how fit you are, or how strong you are, death is cruel. It can strike anyone, anytime, unexpectedly without warning.

No one is invincible.

Marathon

This morning was my first training session for the Auckland Marathon, coming up on October 29th. I did a ~6 km run which took me 37 mins. A shocking time considering I've done 5 km in around 23 mins. However the point was to slowly build endurance through long slow runs, which will help me last the 42 km distance.

I had a training programme devisied by the amazing Wayne Oxenham of Orion Health. Basically he stressed that I start slowly, then each subsequent week I put in a little more effort. Once my effort reaches a peak I taper off my effort. This is what is called a recovery period, which is critical to building performance. After recovery I start small again, then put in just a bit more effort until I peak again. The idea is that I should be able to hit my peak more readily and recover quicker from that peak.

After training I went to Kathmandu to buy some Polypropelene clothing. Since winter brings all sorts of rubbish weather, especially in Auckland, I felt that this item will be crucial to my training in the winter period. Basically Polypropelene, or in lay terms Thermal Underwear, will keep me warm whilst running in cold weather. It will also keep me dry if I happen to be caught in a rain storm. Well I'm not exactly sure how dry but obviously I'll have to wear some sort of light waterproof jacket on top!

NZ Music Month

May 2006 was NZ Music month. This was the month where a lot of New Zealanders can appreciate homegrown music and when the New Zealand music industry heavily promotes NZ artists, bands and their material through various media.

Throughout NZ Music month, Sky City Auckland acted as a venue where various NZ bands can perform live to the public for free. Lots of acts, from Katchafire to Nesian Mystik were involved.

One of my favourite NZ bands is Goldenhorse. They are an easy listening group that targets a more mature audience. Their music is an infectious, quirky combination of rock, pop and folk, and contains that unique, yet recognisable, NZ flavour. One of their earliest songs, Golden Dawn and Maybe Tomorrow, contains some very sensitive and beautiful lyrics, which made me a big fan of Goldenhorse. They also write their own songs, which is a testement to their abilities. Here are some lyrics to Golden Dawn and Maybe Tomorrow:

Like the red sunlight, when I wake up, It's streaming through my window shining through my bedroom door, You are the golden dawn and I'm loving and I'm loving you.....

There's a story I know, we all leave and let go, there is nothing to hold us. In a moment of time when the fruit becomes wine, and the thought becomes the memory.....

To conclude NZ Music month, it was fitting that Goldenhorse would get to perform the final act at Sky City. And it was crowded! Luckily myself and a friend managed to get up to the front of the crowd, cold drinks in hand. Goldenhorse performed around 17 songs, including Golden Dawn and Maybe Tomorrow. It was great to see them live and to see the crowd getting into it and being receptive to their performance.

I managed to take some pictures of the gig, which I've attached below. The picture shows the lead vocalist of Goldenhorse, Kirsten Morell.