Echoes

So what’s been happening in the world of Ray? Well as you all know Charlie was born three months ago and is doing well. She is so wonderful, she sleeps well and eats well like her dad; she smiles and laughs a lot! We love her so much.
But what else is happening for me? Well in less than a week I embark on the six-foot track race, boy that’s been building for ages! I guess this time next week I will be sleeping or seriously relaxing. Canberra is all but 6 weeks away so that’s not really that far off either!
Works great and I’m about as happy as I have ever been, life is good! I hope I will be able to get into the habit of Blogging a bit more in the future. But we have to take these things slow as to not bore you people too much right?

Razor

Introducing...

It is my great pleasure to introduce the newest member of our family, Charlie Ann Rowell, born 5th December 2007 at 1:53pm, Weighing 3.5kg (7lb. 12oz) with a length of 50cm. Mother and Baby are doing well, they are both extremely content and happy. Katie did such a wonderful job in the delivery, no drugs, all guts and glory to her, she was awesome. Everything is great.




























Razor

new post

Well it has been some time since I blogged, in the time since I last did so things have progressed very well for Katie and myself. The baby is growing as it should and by this time in 2 weeks or less we should have a newborn, which is very exciting. Work is treating me well, I have progressed to a new position, which I am enjoying very much and finding more challenging than my previous one. So all god, I really cant wait for my holiday though, which starts in 1 week. Everything else is going great guns, I am really enjoying running at the moment, just taking it easy, not racing to hard and just trying to have fun, if anyone asks what my next race is, my answer is always “Six Foot” so that’s several months away so lots of time to soak up the atmosphere. I hope I will be able to blog a little more in future just have to find the time. Cya.

Razor

Fitzroy falls race report.

1-5km
5.20 – 5.07 – 4.57 – 5.21 – 4.35
Starting off at 8am we headed down the track and over some undulating hills, and worked our way towards the 10km turn around (5km in). The temperature was great, just a slight cool breeze and the air was quite brisk. I was feeling great, the speed felt good and the hills presented no problems for me. Carol was just ahead so I started to pull her in as I knew that I was faster on the hills. We passed the 5km drink station and Carol and I were running together.

6-10km
4.59 – 5.03 – 5.15 - 5.07 – 5.24
Running really well at this point, both Carol and I were catching Sarg at the drink stations, much to his dismay. The overall quality of the track was great, with a section of it on the road, which felt great; some quick negotiation through a rough patch where a tree had fallen was a bit of fun. Carol raced ahead at this point and for a short time I lost sight of her, I knew that I would see her again. Looking from the track for a short time took me in the wrong direction for several seconds, that could have been bad, but I saw the tape before it was too late. Once again I caught Sarg at the 10km drink station. We headed off together.

11-15km
5.28 – 5.20 – 5.23 – 5.09 – 5.37
Pushing up a few mild hills and, still feeling really good, as you can see averaging about 5.25min/km, so this is where I should have been for most of the race. Along the way to this point I had had 2 GU’s and at least 1 cup of water at each drink stop. So I was feeling pretty good about the rest of the race, and each time I looked at my Garmin I was about 5-8min ahead of my projected time. The bells weren’t ringing!

16-20km
5.04 – 5.16 – 5.21 – 4.58 – 4.54
Still a good deal ahead of my projected time, and feeling great, so much so it looks like I picked the pace up a little. Almost pumping the air with the feeling of coming home in under 3hr 45min. I caught Carol while running down a rutted fire trail, we both started to take a guy on his right, Carol pulling ahead of me, as we took him she said something, taking her eyes from the road for a second, a rock caught her foot and she fell down. The Garmin was destroyed and a serious graze all over her stomach as well as some damage to her elbow and knee. The gentle man that we were passing was gracious enough to stop and help her up. She appeared to be ok so we kept running. Before long I took her on an up hill stretch, and before long I was well in front of her.

21-25km
5.05 – 5.13 – 5.05 – 5.12 – 6.23
Hit some of the tougher track at this point, and judging from my above times started to struggle a little, the fast first half was starting to take its course. I downed a salt tablet at this point along with some fruit and water. I do believe that at this point we also hit the white stuff! The track turned into this really bright white dirt that was reflecting the sun like you wouldn’t believe and some nasty hills, particularly a very steep climb that I walked. This afforded me the opportunity to take a look back, on some of the switchbacks, to see who was following. So far not too many people, I was ahead of them all. A long run down to the turnaround I passed Bluedog and Sarg coming back from the turn. I was still feeling great.

26-30km
5.41 – 6.49 – 5.18 – 6.26 – 5.57
I took the turn around well had another drink of water and some more GU, then headed back along the track. I passed Carol coming towards me; she was about 1.5km behind then Dave who looked to be going really strong about 2km behind and then Deanne maybe 4.5km behind. It was as I approached the 30km drink stop that I felt the first sign of the cramps, so I stopped and had some more to drink and some watermelon. Several people passed me as I walked.

31-35km
7.34 – 7.22 – 5.43 – 6.13 – 7.52
Running on the cramps started to get worse and worse, at points so painful that I had to stop and was almost reduced to tears. As I hobbled along people passed by me and I watched the 3hr 45min est. pass by, then the 3hr 50min, after that I stopped caring, I just focused on finishing. Some nice down hill gave me some speed but the pain was always there. Lots of walking as fast as I could at this point. I kept passing people then had them pass me not 100mtrs down the track. Although very painful it is the moment I am most proud of, I pushed on despite the pain, and I trained long and hard to feel this hurt!

36-40km
7.11 – 6.27 – 7.26 – 7.17 -11.31
The hardest 5km of my life, let’s just say the cramps came fast and furious, 100mtres of running then some walking, I think I might have cried out in pain at points. It was so hard to hold back the tears while this was happening. As you can see the 40th kilometre was the slowest. I think I spent close to 5 minutes on the side of the track laying down, this would be where my chocolate pocket GU exploded, Dave also passed me at this point Carol long ago having passed me. The worst thing I did was lay down; very hard to stand up when there is so much cramp pain but some how I got up and forged on!

41-42km
6.12 – 4.49
I pushed through the last 2kms with the promise of seeing Katie and finishing. Some really great down hill here and some sharp little up hills, but I managed them well, and managed to ward off the craps with the power of my mind, “with his mind!” as promised Katie was waiting at the bottom of the hill with Tim and Bec, I pushed the tears back and took the bottom as well as I could. Running up a small hill into the finishing straight I watched as a man fell not 20mtres in front of me no more than 60mtres from the finish, he recovered, I forged on. Finishing the race was the most emotional part of the whole event, the tears tried to make their way back but I held them off. I was so happy to have achieved this. My finishing time 4hrs 06min 24sec. I am extremely proud of myself, this is by far the hardest thing I have ever done!

I still felt in a lot of pain at the end but was welcomed home by lots of people, so the pain was secondary to the feelings that I received, thanks to everyone who was there for me.

I will go back to FFFTM and have revenge, but I must say that I’m really happy with my time, over all I had a great run and felt great running it and in the end I have finished a Marathon.














All that you do...
RΛΣΩR

A grand old time.

It was the year of two thousand and seven, Thursday October the eleventh to be exact. About the house there was a noticeable air of excitement, and the tang of sports drink. This could mean but one thing; a marathon was about.
What a strange unruly thing a marathon is, one moment your running seven days a week on a variety of surfaces, then you find that the distance, time and expectation drops off, and you enter the taper! The taper comes about like a ghost in the night, dawning on the day of five days out and hanging in your subconscious like a pleasant dream. You run as if on air, you sleep to the late hours of the morning and you consume enough food to feed the crew of the mighty Lady Nelson out of Deptford, England.
It is a grand time, the expectation almost too much. It was on this day that the lady Katherine came to me in the early hours of the morning and proclaimed…

Needless to say with all this wind bagging that I’m quite excited about doing this marathon and late this evening I found myself bouncing off the walls at work due to the sheer amount of sugary goods that I have had to consume. I think the people that I work with think that I am a pig and that it has nothing to do with running at all.

Cant wait to get on the trail and beat out a few KM’s.

In the immortal words of Kenji Fukui: “Bang a gong lets get it on!”





RΛΣΩR

Have you ever looked at the stars?

Well that’s less than a week to go today, things are starting to look up, I have had a cold all week and only found out the other day that it had transmutatated into a throat infection. So a hand full of antibiotics, another handful of vitamins and acinesia seem to be doing the trick. So on the day, fingers crossed, I will be firing on all cylinders.

The week leading up looks to be a relaxed one, with all serious-ous runs finishing up on Tuesday and then a relaxed end to the week with a huge meal plan and lots of rest. So here is to our marathon training.


Eclipse
(Waters) 2:04

All that you touch
All that you see
All that you taste
All you feel.
All that you love
All that you hate
All you distrust
All you save.
All that you give
All that you deal
All that you buy,
beg, borrow or steal.
All you create
All you destroy
All that you do
All that you say.
All that you eat
And everyone you meet
All that you slight
And everyone you fight.
All that is now
All that is gone
All that's to come
and everything under the sun is in tune
but the sun is eclipsed by the moon.

"There is no dark side of the moon really. Matter of fact it's all dark."

RΔΣΩR.

Training and other tips.

Had a good training session this morning, 7 wild Wally’s, the only problem that I faced was huge amounts of cut grass in the park made my hay-fever play up, so at times I was having a lot of trouble breathing. But with that I still did a time that I’m happy with. I averaged around 2:40min for each of them, so cool.
For the rest of the week I’m up for a slow 28min run tomorrow (I think Sean thought that I raced the ½ on the weekend), so I think I will do a 1hr run at home, maybe a little longer if I feel like it. Thursday I have 4x1200m loop, which should be fun (note sarcasm). Then a soft Friday 30min run and then the weekend HORAY!
Only 3 weeks till the marathon, so far so good, touch wood, I feel really happy with the way my training has proceeded. The company for this process has been grandiose at best and awe-inspiring at worst, so thanks to all my fans.

Great advise they have given me:

• Always start with a good warm up (skipping ropes are great as are fit balls)
• Always finish with a good cool down (a cold drink is best)
• Try running with hydration at all times (Bottles are good, camel packs are better, both are best)
• Always carry your mobile phone or loose change in case you need to call for a pick up (the rattle of the coins will throw off other runners, this is good!)
• Make sure you always run near toilets (make the block central to your run if possible)
• Dangerous roads are good places to practice sprints.
• When you have an injury scare always consult chat rooms before seeking medical advice, “free” advice is always at hand from trained professionals*.
• Sustagen the night before a race is not a good idea (see point 5 [toilet block running])!
• Heavy drinking the night before can enhance your performance. (Just a little… actually there is not real proof to back this up.)
• And always have a sharp alias or alibi to hide behind if you get caught out!

So that’s that, if I follow these simple rules I should do well come Fitzroy Falls in 3 weeks.

Razor.

*trained professionals may not be trained professionals.