Onto The Next One
It's a new year and there are trails to run. After achieving absolutely everything I wanted to last year, will I still have the drive in '23 only time will tell!
Dreams will get you nowhere, a good kick in the pants will take you a long way.
Baltasar Gracian
The First Earworm For ‘23
I really love this song from Birdy, in 2020 when there was so much chaos and everything was closing, then the same happened in 2021, it felt like there wasn’t much light at the end of the tunnel. After a big 2022, it feels like we’re on the other side and life is slowly getting back to normal, here’s to the runventures of 2023.
Hold tight, you're slowly coming back to life
I'll be keeping your head up
New Year, New Dreams?
For as long as I can remember football coaches of mine have sat down teams I’ve played in at the start of the year, and asked us what our goal is.
Most people would be lying to you if they told you their goal wasn’t to win a premiership every single year they played. These sessions felt more like having your teeth pulled than being beneficial to team success, but it seems to be the common thing to do.
Why am I writing about goal setting and football? Because right now billions of people across the world have either physically or verbally exchanged their hopes, dreams and goals for this year.
The example above is the most common one and could apply more broadly than football, in much the same way that our goals for the new year will likely be generic, we want health, happiness and love. We always want the best, and of course it’s human nature to be selfish in a way, I’m not saying goal setting shouldn’t be done, it's just important not to get too wrapped up in goals at the start of the year for several reasons.
Most of us are likely to set overly ambitious goals which can be demotivating and lead to feelings of inadequacy or failure if they are not met. For about a year I was so wrapped up in feeling like I had to run a certain pace to fit in, when clearly that’s not the case.
I’m always overly cautious of setting highly difficult goals, last year I set two goals for my running that would benefit the races I was going for, which at the time including an ultra marathon at Stromlo, and anything else I achieved was just a cherry on top:
50,000 metres of climbing elevation
3,000 kilometres run for the year
This year I’m yet to set goals for either or any long term goals at all, and will be going with the approach of just following my training each week dependent on what race I want to do. I feel that by doing this I’m less likely to undermine my confidence or hinder progress towards my races.
I just don’t want to focus too heavily on one thing in particular, I want to be flexible and leave myself open to new opportunities and experiences that may arise throughout the year. What I’ve learnt during my short time in running is that it's important to have a sense of direction and purpose, but it's also important to remain open to change and adaptability.
The other reason I haven’t set any key major goals is because I don’t want to lose sight of the bigger picture and neglect other important aspects of my life, such as relationships, personal well-being, and self-care. Last year I found that despite training for a 100 kilometre race I was able to maintain a healthy balance in all areas of life, rather than becoming overly focused on achieving a particular goal.
I’m keen to know what approach others take at the start of the year, are you a big goal setter or are you someone that goes with the flow at the stat of the year?
Here’s To Going Out And Getting It
I had ambitions on Saturday to run a marathon with a group that were going out and running the local Cotter Loop (23 kilometres) and a 10 kilometre out and back leading to 20 kilometres for a marathon, on a pretty undulating surfact.
Su-Ann had never run a marathon before but set the goals to run ‘40 kilometres before 40’. That’s a few years off, but she absolutely nailed it with the help of a group of us including Jodie, who I spent a lot of time with on Saturday just chatting about goals and life.
I wanted to go on and run the marathon, but decided to save myself the tough explainer with Coach Shiree, and also kept the same approach I took into UTK, which is being able to run more often is better than being able to run for a long time not as often.
I’m so pumped for Jillian as well who ran the furthest she ever has, and also Dannielle D, who looks like she is getting back to some good form after dealing with some niggles and injuries.
My Post Ultra Trail Kosciuszko Recovery
To say it’s been less than adequate has been an understatement. I’ve been very lucky that physically the worst aspects of my physical recovery have just been general soreness and some blister pads being required for where my foot strikes the ground and my right ankle, where a blister has formed.
In general it feels like I’ve been on about 60 per cent for two weeks, with the best I’ve felt the night I got eight and a half hours sleep on Christmas Eve.
Post the race I got two hours the afternoon after the race, and then it’s been around four to six hours a night, with the exception of Christmas Eve, and it’s hardly been quality sleep based on the graph below:
You see leading into Kosciuszko and after it I’ve been covering for our breakfast newsreader, which means getting into work before 5am. I’m terrible when I have early alarms, I am a little bit better now I set multiple alarms on my Garmin, but I used to sometimes miss alarms that were on my phone and it’s always induced a high rate of panic.
It’s meant as I said before I feel like I’ve been going around at 60 per cent despite my body essentially being back to normal physically. I described it on Saturday to my friend Jodie like every time I run at the moment it feels like I’m on a treadmill and I have to work twice as hard to get going.
I’m writing this on a Sunday Night and know by the time people read this I’ll probably have had my best sleep in probably a month, and well and truly be back on the road to getting back to my best.
In terms of my heart rate it’s been a bit hit and miss and I think this is purely down to not getting enough sleep:
In the months leading up to December my heart rate average while resting sat around 46 to 48, as I type these words now it’s 66, I had a couple of beers yesterday that could’ve impacted it, however the recovery has made my heart rate spike quicker than it normally would.
For example, going to get a drink it might jump to 90 beats, where normally it would only spike to maybe 70 if that, when I caught Covid-19 in the middle of last year the same trip would take me up to 120 beats per minute, so my heart rate is somewhere around fatigued I’d say.
The thing is when it’s under working conditions in particular the two parkruns I have done since UTK, it’s not maxed out like it normally would under the effort I’ve put in. I’ll have more to discuss and compare next week off the back of some decent sleep, but for now I’m putting my higher heart rate just purely down to lack of sleep and the general stress I put on my adrenal system from moving 100 kilometres in a day.
At this stage it’s just being patient and knowing that this is normal, what I do know for sure is I’ll be taking a few days either side of my next 100 kilometre race!
Five Kilometres That Mean So Much
parkrun was founded in 2004 by Paul Sinton-Hewitt in London, England, with the first event taking place at Bushy Park in Teddington. Sinton-Hewitt started parkrun because he wanted to create a fun, inclusive, and supportive event that would encourage people of all ages and abilities to get active and participate in regular physical activity.
He was inspired by the positive impact that regular exercise had on his own health and well-being, and he wanted to create a way for others to experience the same benefits. Sinton-Hewitt also wanted to create a community-driven event that would bring people together and foster a sense of belonging and social connection. Overall, parkrun was founded with the goal of creating a healthier, more active world by getting more people running, jogging, and walking in their local communities.
The event quickly gained popularity and spread to other locations in the United Kingdom and around the world. Today, there are parkrun events in more than 20 countries on six continents. The organisation's mission is to create a healthier and more active world by getting more people running, jogging, and walking in their local communities.
parkrun is written as one word with a lowercase 'p', representing the simplicity and inclusivity of the organisation and the events. Everyone plays a part in creating the distinctive parkrun environment.
Since UTK I’ve found parkrun to be my saving grace while I can’t complete longer runs, it’s easy to get around it and feel a sense of community. I’m still a relative parkrun ‘newbie’ with four runs under my belt, but part of me wishes I found it earlier, because it is truly accessible for anyone and everyone to be a part of it. I’m looking forward to journaling more about the people that make parkrun what it is.
My 2023 Calendar So Far
Kowen New Year’s Resolution Run - 15 January
The Archie - 18th February
Gumbaby - 23rd April
Potential Radar:
Bright 4 Peaks
Stromlo 50
Bondi2Manly
Sri Chimnoy Canberra 100
Ultra Trail Kosciuszko 100
Poutinerest - my own Neverest Challenge
Where are you guys racing this year? Is there any race that I should have on my radar going forward?
None Of This Is Possible Without You
Thank you so much for reading Peak2Soon! I'm glad you enjoyed my journey to Kosciuszko and I hope you'll continue to follow along, Peak2Soon started as a way to follow me, but it’s become so much more than that, and I’ve enjoyed the different conversations and people I’ve met as a result of the blog.
If you have any thoughts or feedback, please don't hesitate to leave a comment or share my blog with others. Thank you again for your support!
Wowser Fordy, can't wait to run on some of these fun-runs in coming months.
Training is more enjoyable when there is less pressure and you just go with the flow too 😁👌