Karen and Kate's journey to Ironman and beyond

Well its 2 days after the marathon. I feel great until I move. sharp pain down both legs. I also do not think that those muscles belong to me as they want to move the legs in a different direction to the way I want to go. We went out on a bus trip yesterday to look at the city. As you can see from the photo I had to have priority seating and walking down the stairs was painful. Still I am very pleased with my time and I know tomorrow my legs will feel better.

Just proving, anywhere, anytime, wearing anything is good for a run!   Today I had a recovery run by the Indian Ocean, we saw a glimpse of it when we finished our marathon on Sunday, but today got a chance to get our feet (and in my case my jeans too) wet!  Just fabulous.

It is 5am, we have both been awake for a while, and we have just had the first of probably several breakfasts and had a good discussion about yesterday.  Both of us have been thinking about the 30 year old man who went out to run a marathon and never came home again, we know these things happen very very rarely, but it still makes you think about the nature of the event, and of course feel very sad that something which had been entered into with excitement and anticipation ended in such a way. I don’t feel like I ran a marathon yesterday.  Today, not a chafe, or a blister or even a sore bit.  I am still tired, but that is probably as much a left-over from mixed up sleeping hours and the last traces of my cold.    Things to be liked: Beautiful route with interesting scenery The chance to experience a perfect early morning in a strange city Friendly volunteers, some stood out, especially the children. The talkers, there weren’t that many, most seemed to be...

I cut my caffeine back a couple of weeks ago, and then last week stopped it. It was a big thing for me.  There were two reasons for cutting it, one was to be in relatively good shape nutritionally before the marathon, but the other reason was so that the caffeinated supplements I was planning on using would work better on the day. I have just read the labels on the Gu gels I was swigging at regular intervals throughout the marathon.  They had no caffeine in them.   I haven't run a run longer than 15km without caffeine since...well, I cant remember when.   I feel rather silly.   But that might explain why I came close to losing it from a head point of view towards the end. Below a pic, get a look at the rubbish, there were powerade bottle lids literally carpeting the ground.   Considering Perth is such a clean city, people were just dropping stuff everywhere, empty gel packets, the little tear off tops, drink containers.  Some of those har...

My legs hurt, my feet are sore, but I did it! 4hours 46 minutes, wow 33minutes faster than the last Marathon. It seems a long time since we got up at 3:45 am. breakfast and a careful time getting dressed and off for the big race. There were not a huge number of us but we were all very excited. It was Dark when we started off, quite fast and down hill. I soon got into my own stride and Karen went off. I soon got talking to 2 people who had arrived the night before from South Africa. The All Blacks had lost the rugby, but that's ok we can still win the world cup. Any way we got talking about Marathons that we had done. They had been to the great wall of China to do one, also New York and Paris. Karen and I plan to do the Paris one, but China, not thought of that one. I was having a great run and was enjoying myself. next person I ran with was a solider who was running in full gear. I do not usually go up to strangers and start talking, but as I got closer to him I realized...

I am sitting on a sofa with my feet up, the sun is shining, there are alien (to a kiwi) bird noises outside and there is pizza from the supermarket heating up in the oven. The Perth marathon over…all the hype and worrying and decision making is behind us.  I think you get to a point where you aren’t having paroxysms of terror when you line up at a start line, more anxiety about what you have forgotten and a vague memory of discomfort your brain has suppressed from the last time. Anyway, it started early in the morning, it was still dark and we walked through the city streets with occasional other ‘runner’ looking people popping out of doors and heading to the assembly area.  It was a huge field, but it didn’t have a huge number of people on it (heard later that about 800 of the 42000 participants were marathon runners).   The tall buildings had lights and impressive electronic billboards, and some bright spark had decreed that marathon runners needed to warm up wit...

We arrived in Perth on Friday evening after a delayed but uneventful flight from Auckland .   Flying sure has changed, I got all excited to have my own screen in the back of the chair in front, with movies (nah…nothing I wanted to watch there), television programme reruns (only fools and horses was a trip through history), and games.  I did think I had destroyed the planes computer system when I was trying to have a game of solitaire, the black screen of death complete with rolling error messages had me looking furtively round to check if anyone had seen what I had done.  The cabin staff kindly reset it for me, just the games, not the planes navigation computer thankfully. Saturday was time for registering for the marathon at the Perth convention centre, the city seemed surprisingly quiet but that may have had something to do with the fact that our bodies were still operating on Auckland time which was 4 hours earlier than the local time.    Then w...

Finally sorted out the fundraising link, its on the right hand side of the page near the top.   Funds raised will be held by the Diabetes Projects Trust in a separate account for Christchurch, and the only deduction is the fee from the FundraiseOnline people which is about 5% for the transactions which goes directly to them...more about that on their website if you want to know more. Anyway, 6 months out from Ironman, some big challenges ahead of us before then, hopefully we can raise something to help out our friends and colleagues down in Christchurch.   And to the dear soul who suggested 1cent per km sponsorship for the marathon this weekend, we will very gladly have your 84c! Nearly time to go, the time came round very quickly.  My cold is going away, Kate is now not feeling the need to sit out in the passage to talk to me since I am not coughing and sneezing everywhere. Anyway, tomorrow at this time we will be in the air, headed for warmer weather and strange b...

You might ask Thighs!. Well its a question I need to ask? Last night at spin we did an exercise where your thigh had to touch the top bar of your bike. It was quite a hard exercise and I had to really concentrate to move different muscles. But the question is why did we do it?. The class was a long hard class and the AGM meeting was following so I did not have time to ask. It is one of those questions I will have to remember next time. I was supposed to take it easy last night. I am on the run down for the Marathon on Sunday. But it was a good class and the boys had moved my bike, again, so I am now at the front of the class. It is really hard to slack off when everyone can see what you are doing. The session lasted 70 Min's and I was shattered when I came off my bike. 27 ks of long hard slog. Got home to supper and sat in a stupor for a couple of hours before bed. Well that has got to be the last exercise. I need to rest and get ready for Sunday. Looking at the weather its going ...

Halfway through yesterday I developed a sore throat and got progressively more headachy  and miserable. After a night of tossing and turning and sucking on strepsils, I woke up this morning knowing it wasn’t a good day to go to work and share my bugs around.   I got the girls off to school, and went back to bed and pretty much didn’t move for the rest of the day until I had to pick the girls up again. When you are in fit condition you rarely catch bugs, or if you do they often aren't too bad and go away quickly.  But when you build your fitness up to another higher level its quite common to go from one infection to another while your body copes with the stress of doing so much more than it is used to.   I've pushed things harder than I ever have in recent months, I guess its not a surprise that I should succumb, what BAD timing though, why couldn't it have happened last weekend?   The important thing now is to get over it...and soon. But, its not just tha...

Last week I went out and bought a bottle of lepin with a reusable bottle. This seemed like a good idea. On Saturday before my last long run I filled it up, put it into my fuel belt and off I went on my run. First stop out the bottle came and I squeezed, but no lepin came out. Squeezed again and then it came out around the lid and all over my fingers... sticky horrid stuff, I hate having sticky fingers. What was wrong with the bottle, I opened up the lid and there was a silver lining in the lid that I had not removed. Little things come to try us! Good job I have tried all my equipment out now so I should not have any of these issues on Sunday at the Marathon. OMG its this Sunday, am I ready? Not sure but have followed a plan, well almost, so it will be interesting to see. But no sticky fingers, I hope.

I went for my last ‘real’ run this morning, 20km along the Maraetai waterfront to Duders beach with the Tepuru runners, I wont see them for a couple of weeks now and then I will be recovering, doing much less mileage.    It started out frosty when I left home, I found some grass covered in the pristine white stuff and couldn’t resist vandalising it with patterns of footsteps.  It was another perfect running morning, clear, sun reflecting on the sea, and I felt really good. My time alone running is my thinking time, and even being part of the running group I get plenty of that because I often need more distance and keep going a bit further by myself.   This time I was thinking about ‘rules’.    What started me off were the words of a woman I got a pair of offroad shoes from, she said she “brought them and then got into the barefoot running craze”.   It got me imagining how nice it would be to strip things back to the basics, break a...

Today I was at uni. Doing a paper on Pharmacology. It was good, lots to learn, particularly when to take my anti inflammatory drugs before I start to run. But I got talking to a girl called Heather from Christchurch. She is struggling to do her studies as the earth quake has caused her great grief.  Her House is OK and in the green zone, but all the other houses around her are in the red Zone. She has no chimney and the snow has fallen and caused more leaks in the roof. She lost a friend in the CTV building and is grieving.  This made me run hard tonight. There is a good reason to fund raise and give something to the nurses at the diabetes unit in Christchurch. It makes me realize how lucky we are. Good Luck to all who live in Christchurch and I hope the weather improves soon.

So close to the end of the training programme, I have hit a couple of weeks of not seeming to be in control of my time.   Co-ordinating treatment for the damaged calf muscles meant some extra days off, you can’t run on the day you have treatment, and if it was intensive, the following day might need to be taken off too.  Its also not just a matter of clumping together all the runs you have missed, a balance of working hard and resting is still essential, especially taking time off before and after the weekly long run.  The need to travel for important family commitments has also modified my plans, there is of course no question about such things taking priority.   Then there are the unpredictable glitches, like last night I couldn’t leave home until after 8.30pm, and I can tell you it is really hard to leave a warm house that late on a winter evening, actually, I’ve been tired enough lately that I have been thinking about bed at that hour! So I had an ear...

Any organisation which wants to do a small thing to contribute to the physical activity levels of their staff could consider what the DPT does.  DPT, among other things, set up a ‘sports club’ which matches staff member contributions of $1-2 per week.  This money can accumulate and be spent on such things as sports equipment, event registrations, gym memberships etc.   It doesn’t sound like a whole lot, but it does build up over time, and certainly helps reduce the financial barriers to exercise.  Its helpful too to have an environment supportive of physical activity, from the Board members to the team on the ground.  While I vaguely remember that there might have been a concerned suggestion that Kate and myself might not finish our first full round Taupo 160km cycle (after barely managing 60km in training, but that’s another story), usually the support is whole hearted and tremendously inspiring…which brings its own obligations…who would dare not complete ...

Kate has been thinking about food, so have I, but its not really a surprise we have both coincidentally written about the same thing at the same time, you cant help it when you have a case of the exercise induced screaming hungries all the time.  But it is less than 2 weeks to go to M day and what is really the official start of our Ironman preparation, so I realise it is time I took a look at what I am eating.   Of course I should have been paying attention all through my training but I have to admit I haven’t been particularly wise with my nutrition, but what stands out is taking in too much caffeine.  The main source is energy drinks which tend to creep up on you, occasional use goes to daily use when it is report writing time, goes to maximum recommended to help get through assignment writing or exam time, and just fails to drop off again when the pressure goes down.  I don’t drink tea or coffee, but if you add some dark chocolate into the mix, then som...

Last night I went to spin. It was a nice session with lots of short sharp exertions. Stopped for a chat and a glass of water and a few chips, but I was starving hungry. I had a pony club meeting booked at the local Thai so off I went, still hungry! I had to pinch some of the kids food as theirs came first, then I eat all my dish and the rice then finished off my friends dish. I could not get enough food. Eventually I was satisfied. Wow this exercise is good! 

I didn’t want to go out to do 60 minutes, it was cold and dark, raining and there was hail on and off.  There had also been snow in Auckland earlier in the day.  Hey, there was SNOW in Auckland , I had to go out! My children can tell their grandchildren when it next snows (in another 70 or so years) that old Great Nana Ka had been mad enough to go for a run last time it happened (slight twist of the facts, I didn’t run IN the snow).   I can hear the sighs from the South Island , sad Aucklander, I can even pick up sniggers from Palmerston North (yes, R, I hear you), but it is all relative.   It’s an event, and on this occasion, an Event with a capital E, and events are a useful part of the mental games you play to make yourself go outside when you really don’t want to go outside.   For example, I have run when I flipped a coin 7 times and most were heads, I have run when the phone didn’t ring by 6.30pm, I  have run when it refused to ra...

It is an interesting fact that both Karen and myself are lacking confidence. My running has slowed up, its too cold wet and snowing today to do anything. I planned to do 20 k yesterday but, shopping and daughter got in the way. Then it started raining. I managed to do a good 7 k which I felt good after but its not the 20 I wanted to do. Today I went to the dentist and spent a small fortune on a cracked tooth. I am nursing a sore mouth and no food , so running is out of the question. Im feeling sorry for myself. no run today. I will be back tomorrow and really looking forward to some warmth in Perth. But will I be ready? 

Lower leg problems at the end of last week (tight calves putting pressure on the Archilles tendons) meant I strayed seriously from the training programme.   I’m a bit sad about that, having worked so hard and passed through the heaviest weeks it would have been nice to finish the programme off successfully.  Lesson learned, don’t muck around with ongoing injury, get it sorted early. The trip to the sports massage people left me regretting my inattention, I had let my calves get very ‘knotted up’, and the treatment was long, uncomfortable, and required some days off, which were also long and uncomfortable (whoever thinks massage is a treat, think again).  On the weekend I had a 23km run around my favourite country roads on the Whangarei heads, but was unable to enjoy even that as much as I usually would, for while I didn’t have any of the normal pain, I was tired and grumpy and feeling out of sorts, and of course worried.  What happens if I lose my fitness ...

Wednesday is my run night. I try and do it with my friend Charl. But her husband went AWOL and she had 5 kids to look after! not sure who's kids but still a good enough reason to have the night off. Elizabeth had arrived back from her big holiday with the thought of doing a marathon. So I asked her to run with me. She is a natural runner and with no training ran much faster than me. But still its good to have friends to run with. Elizabeth had been away for 2 months but knew more gossip than me so we chatted all the way home. It seemed like we had flown home much faster than usually. I must get a watch and time the run.

Kate and me went shopping for running singlets to take to Australia , our old red ones are past their best after several years of waving the Diabetes Projects Trust (DPT) flag.  Strangely we had a moment of disquiet when we briefly glanced at the Adidas stand, kept walking and eventually after much trying on and critiquing in the mirror ended up with bright blue Nike singlets, which the nice man let us have at a reduced price (it pays to be cheeky and ask).  The singlets met our criteria of – quick-dry fabric, no sticking out bits under the arm, cover straps underneath, a little bit of space around the tummy so as not to look like a sausage stuffed into a skin, long enough to cover the top of the tri-shorts a bit, price, and of course a cute colour.   Now we have to decide what writing and branding to put on them.   We want them to say what we are doing to see if we can get some support from over the Tasman, plus thank our sponsors/supporters…at this point ...

First bit of good news, the Mangere Eye Clinic people have risen to the challenge and are going to take us on in the ARPHS Feetbeat challeng e….go Raukura for organising that!  We of course responded with some sabotage by locking their volunteer (read ‘conscripted’) walking team leader in our offices and setting the alarm off on him on Thursday.  Actually, that was an accident, please come back Dale we promise we wont do it again.  I am glad also that our special trophy, gold painted croc shoe on a small piece of 3x2 timber…also gold painted...will be suitably aspired towards. A nyway, the second piece of good news is I managed my last 'long run' on the current programme with a 30km run yesterday. After feeling thoroughly demoralised and worried that I was going to actually end up with a genuine excuse to cut back on the training because of tendon problems, it would seem that my main issue is having tight calf muscles and the stretching, ice and panadol are making the wor...

I booked in to have my feet done at Norma's on Sunday, but I also needed to run. I mapped out the route  from Grahams beach to home and it was 17k. not as long as I wanted but it would be testing as there are a few hills! Actually they are gullies. So I had a very relaxing podiatry session and a painful eye brow plucking and off I went for my run. The wind was blowing a gale, new experience, but it was dry. The hills were not too bad and I did try running up a little way. But then about half way home the big black clouds came. I thought I would be OK but the wind blow, the rain came down very hard. I rang home for the Taxi. It was disappointing not to finish but it was good to get home to a hot bath and an afternoon sleep.

I have had 2 weeks off swimming,not good, I arrived early for my session and warmed up with 8 lengths. Good job I did. Jarad had us swimming lots of lengths,butterfly, back, breast and free style. After 60 minutes i was spent, no more energy and off to the coffee shop for chocolate cake. The swimming is great 5 women in one section, kicking each other and hitting hands, I will be OK by the time Iron man arrives I will be ready! the arms are now pulsating and i can not move but it was good. roll on next week.

I have just got in from a 60 minute 'recovery' type of run.  I went out thinking I would just do half an hour but it is lovely out there, and it is hard to stop even if you know it is the sensible thing to do.  I ran twice along the waterfront, with the few lights reflecting off the dark water on a still night the view is gorgeous.   But I have what I suspect is an evolving archilles injury, it's been grumbling on and off, and now I cant ignore it.  Every time I tried to run up one of my favorite hills it hurt, so I ended up sticking to the flat for a change.   I am sitting with icepacks in my socks, feet up, taken the anti-inflammatories, applied the antiflam, and hoping against hope that it is alright for Sunday's planned 30km.

Spending hours outside sweating has wonderful benefits for the body, but does mess your skin up, I mean you expect wrinkles to come as part of the territory in your fabulous 40's, but spots should have been left behind long ago, and those caused by exercise are not confined to your face.   Now that I am a ‘mature’ person, I reckon I have earned a few things, one of them is the occasional bit of pampering in the form of a nice facial over at a great little place in Takanini.   Of course I know these sorts of things will never turn an old boot into a strappy little high heeled sandal, but perhaps the aim might be for smart little dress boot version rather than one of the agricultural variety.   But the reality is that upset skin is one of the hazards of exercise, the result of all that sun and wind exposure and being sand-blasted by road dirt has the potential to make me want to cover all reflective surfaces in the house, and could reduce the average bea...

I missed my spin classes last week as it was school holidays. Last night we had spin. It was a hard one. We warmed up and then spent 1 minute in what ever gear you wanted but out of your seat and cadence at 90. Hahaha. I got to 76. We did this 8 times. That was good for me, I usually do not get out of my seat. It will be interesting when I get back out onto the road how this training correlates to the Hills. The other interesting thing is how much you sweat. It is vital to get the fluids in all the time.

Over halfway through the 8 week training programme to get marathon ready.   That means, with 34km run  (meant to be 35 but I miscalculated) on Sunday, I have had my hardest training week ever, and the hardest for the programme.   Over the next 4 weeks the amount of effort drops off steadily, how did that happen so quick?   Last night there was strength training planned, and my mind told me all day I really couldn’t  be bothered.  What about a REST my mind was telling my body, you nearly ran a marathon  (only 8km short) 24 hours ago, take the day OFF…go on, you deserve it.     Sigh.     Actually I didn’t take the day off yesterday.   I’m doing that today...a halfway there day off!

Monday night run. There were just 3 of us at the meeting point. I was a little worried as i am a slow runner, but it was not a problem and off we went. The other two were talking away happily and I was huffing and puffing. It took about 3 k before my breathing settled and I could talk again. We got back to the cars and the others went on to run another loop but I had done my allocated 6k on my training plan so off I went to pick the daughter up. So why was i so tired when I got home. I looked at my diet for the day: Chicken rice for lunch, orange cake for afternoon tea, a can of v on the way to running, a piece of cheese cake at the daughters boyfriends house and beef curry at home , which I could not finish. Then I had to go to bed as i was so tired. A bit like a toddler when they have to go to bed as their behaviour has deteriorated. I think my blood sugars must have been doing a dance. Lessons learnt, if I want to run I must eat sensibly.