Just Keep Moving
A much better week running that surpassed even my own expectations, I'm back and in the next few weeks going to set myself up to take down the mountain.
“You’re fine. This is fine. Keep going.”
Courtney Dauwalter
Finding Joy In Movement
“Listen to your body” is a quote that is synonymous with runners across the world, and from what I can see it’s attributed as the slogan of the late Dr. George Sheehan. As a track star in college he followed his father into the world of cardiology. After medical school he served in the Navy in the South Pacific during World War II as a doctor on the battleship USS Daly. Just before leaving for active service he married “the most beautiful woman on the Jersey Shore,” Mary Jane Fleming, and together they subsequently raised a dozen children.
But becoming bored with the security his life had offered him after the war, Dr. Sheehan renewed it at the age of 45 and turned it inside out. He returned to his body, to running, and he shared with his readers all of his experiences in this new world of exercise and play, of sweat and competition, of physical, mental and spiritual challenge.
Five years later, he ran a 4:47 mile, which was the world’s first sub-five-minute time by a 50-year-old. Sadly, he was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 1986, and lived for another seven years despite the cancer spreading to his bones. From what I’ve read he ran until his legs could no longer carry him. Through it all, he remained true to himself, continuing to write about his experiences. This time it wasn’t about running, it was about dying. Going the Distance was his last book. It was published shortly after his death.
One of the common misconceptions that perhaps stopped me running earlier than I did was that you have to run at a certain pace to be considered a runner. People get so caught up in pace and times they forget to simply tie their shoe laces and get outside.
But, this is simply not true. You don’t have to be a world class athlete to enjoy running, and I hope that my journey in running will see more people give it a shot and find the same joy in movement that I have, as Dr. Sheehan showed, all it takes is the courage to start.
Training This Week
The plan this week was just going back to my Zone 2 roots, and run at a comfortable pace, and just see what my body could hold in terms of volume. I battled a bit of sickness, but I made it through, and I’m now feeling a whole lot better about the proposition of Kosciuszko than I did perhaps a week ago. See I knew I had this type of week in me, but actually getting down and doing it was important.
Monday: Rest day, spent the day travelling from Perth (4:25am alarm WA time), ended up getting home to Canberra around 5pm after flying in to Sydney and driving home.
Tuesday: This run really set me up for a good week, I’d come back from Perth and managed to bring a cold and hadn’t really slept well from the night before. I felt so invigorated from running with Kirstie, she’s preparing for a 10km race coming up here in Canberra, these kilometres are some of my favourite because the time goes so quickly when you’re catching up. 9.29km clocked for the day.
Wednesday: Got up in the morning really keen to smash out some kilometres and it just didn’t happen at all, I couldn’t get going and decided to call the morning run on the trails at 4.81km. I had an afternoon run of 6km with Running For Resilience, I declared I was back! How wrong I would be.
Thursday: Intervals with Elevate and I just couldn’t find my top gear at all, felt like this run was the start of shaking out the cobwebs of what was a pretty mediocre running week. 8.42km laid down.
Friday: Woke up early again and rolled through 6km with Running For Resilience, it was Walk To Work Day and I was already dreading the two runs that I had pencilled myself in for, but for some reason I felt good on the run to work over the 6.7km and then the return leg I just took easy. This was a real confidence boosting day, running close to 20km over 3 separate runs with the first being at 6am and the last being at 7pm. 19.4km in total for the day.
Saturday: Really started to find my mojo on Saturday morning, I’d promised my friend Emily that I would get up early and help her with her 33km run that she was doing, but knowing she had different goals to me when I was confident she could I let her drop me. I ended up finishing my run at 26km at around a 7:34 pace per km, but what I was really happy with was that 52.5% of the run was in Zone 2, I’m not going to be breaking any land speed records at Kosciuszko so building the tank has been important. Took the opportunity to try some food combinations which I really liked, Maurten 320 drink mix and Clif Chocolate Brownies appear to be a winning combo.
Sunday: Finishing off the week slow, set the goal here to just get out and moved, the run I did the day before was bigger than my entire previous week, I know what my body can handle and knew a nice slow afternoon run would have me feeling really good about the week. Tested out my second pair of Hierro V7 I’m going to be wearing in December, really loved them, great bounce, chew up the mud and feel like a nice comfy ride. Almost feels like the 1080 but with more aggressive lugs, I like the room that New Balance have allowed for those of us who can’t fit into a pair of Nikes.
Totals: 90.2km, 11 hours and 14 minutes, Elevation Gain 1,031m
Stretch Goals
One thing I’ve never done well since I started running is stretching! I have icing down pat, I have foam rolling, but I have been terrible at stretching. So this week I made the small goal to make sure that after each run I would spend at least 15 minutes stretching out, this is adding to my routine of icing down the legs and also spending about 20 or so minutes with a massage gun on the legs and hips post run. It might only be early days, but already noticing a difference, even if it’s a small one.
Monday Motivation Hero
My introduction to Jin Kato was at last year’s Canberra Beer Mile. I had ambitions of running myself, but after picking up an injury I was purely a spectator for my good friend and runner-up in the race Liam O’Rourke. It was in the relays there was a man running in a suit, and he was quick! I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone slam a beer and then run at that pace even in regular clothes (maybe Sam Burridge).
It wasn’t until earlier this year I learned that it was Jin, at the time I didn’t know his name or who he was. I became a quick learner, my first introduction to trail running in a group saw me strike up a conversation with Jin at the start of the morning, we got talking about running and why we love trails, by the end of the session it struck me that Jin isn’t your average runner.
As one of last week’s Motivation Heroes, William Barlow, put it at the end of the session "for those who don’t know Jin is a really good trail runner” and he is, but he’s also humble and generous.
He’s completed UTA100 while being virtually unable to stand, spending hours sick in the medical tent following a bout of food poisoning days before the event, he’s a Gumbaby champion, he’s completed a quarantine ultra which included 5,000 laps of his balcony, he’s completed the Buffalo Grand Slam where you complete all three races including a 100km and marathon over the weekend back-to-back, and recently he just annihilated a stage race Capital2Coast running across 3 Days, 9 Stages
101.27km with 2144 metres of elevation in 7 hours 25 minutes and 46 seconds at 4:24 average pace! Being the first solo or team person across the line, a super human effort.
The thing for me though, is for all that he has done, Jin will strike up a conversation with anyone. I’m appreciative of the knowledge he has passed on to me throughout perhaps a dozen or so early morning runs at Running For Resilience, and for just being an ear to chat to during some early morning runs, if you have the chance to run into him either on the foot paths of Canberra, or on the trails somewhere across the country, say g’day, you certainly won’t regret it.
I met Jin at my first R4R and was surprised by how friendly he was. His humility is next level, I couldn't believe the runs he'd been on!
I think I could benefit from Zone 2 training. A majority of my runs are in zone 5... clearly I need to slow down haha
Nice Fordy! I’ve struggled to be consistent with stretching too, but found doing it once a week for 15mins has helped keep me injury free. Also I can’t help but feel people to do the same with stretching as what you said about running. I don’t think you need to stretch everyday to be a “stretcher”, and if people don’t do it everyday, they give up.