And yes Jessie, there is another plan...

The City 2 Bay may not be done and dusted yet, but OF COURSE I've set my sights on a new challenge!

I've been wanting to do the Oxfam Trailwalker for some time but a) its interstate (costs too much) and b) I don't know three other weird people who would team up with me to do it. (Actually I don't know even one other person who would)

But the other day as I was looking up something on the South Australian Road Runners Club site, I came across something along the same lines - the Adelaide Trailblazer! Its held at the end of October, and in teams of 2 or 4 you can sign up to 18kms/34kms/50kms/100kms. And I've started trying to convince my hubby that we could pair up and do the 34 kms. 18kms - well I know I can do since doing the 1/2 marathon - but 50 would just be too much too soon - so 34 sounds just about right - and you can walk the whole thing if you want - so sounds quite achievable with moderate training. Now I just have to get him to sign on the bottom line... perhaps I'll cover the page with football piccies and he'll never know.....


Anyway - the other news of late is that I've been experimenting with the virtual trainer on my Garmy. What this does it that you tell it how far you want to run and in what time, and as you run it puts up a split screen on the watch showing how you are running compared to the "pacer man" (stick figure pictures) and at the bottom it tells you how many metres ahead or behind you are of the required pace to meet your goal. I've only used this once before with disastrous results. This was in a 5 km fun/run at Victor Harbour, and because I had never used it before, when it told me in the first km that I was 60 odd metres ahead of the pacer, I didnt realise how significant this was, and how fast that meant I was running. Subsequently I had gone out too fast and nearly didn't manage to finish because I was exhausted. (It did still provide me with a 5km PB - but it was one of the hardest runs of my life!)

Anyway - figured if I could get used to using it, it may be good for the C2B. So tried it out on Tuesday - and told it I wanted to run 5kms in 30mins - which is my planned C2B pace. What I found though was that although it worked well, because I was determined to stay ahead of the pacer man, I still ran the 5kms slightly too fast, averaging about a 5:45/5:50 pace instead of a 6:oo pace. And it was hard. And I'm sure I couldn't have kept it up for 12 kms - actually felt a slight twinge of nausea at the end of the 5kms -nothing too much , but a sign that it wouldn't be manageable over a longer distance. Why didn't you just go slower when you were too far ahead I hear you say? A very good idea, but one I didn't manage to achieve. I kept telling myself "slow down", and consciously tried to "slow down", and then checked my watch and found myself yet another 10 metres ahead! I don't know what my problem was - but I just didn't seem to be able to do it!

Came in for the 5kms about 80 metres in front of Mr Pacer, and in 29:28. That may not sound much faster than a planned 30 mins, but if you multiplied that out for a 12 km run, that would see me finishing in 70. something minutes, when I'm aiming for a PB of 72 minutes. That's actually quite a lot. So I'm thinking I might try it again but set the speed at slightly below 10kms/hr (say 9.9) and then if I aim to stay just ahead - I should be about right. Or I could keep the speed the same, and if I'm too far ahead insert walk breaks to make it more manageable. Don't know - will try out a few of these strategies over the next week leading up to the race.....

By for now - oh and by the way - if you've noticed I've been absent from posting comments on your blog - I'm having problems with my computer. Whenever I go to post a comment, the computer keeps asking me if I want to display the "non-secure" items. I keep saying yes, and it keeps asking me, repeatedly! and so fast that I can't even type a word before it interrupts me again. I'm very frustrated. If anyone knows what setting I need to change, please let me know. I've tried out a few - but nothing seems to work!