Ahh that's better!

Sat  6.00pm  11KM  Roo+Lake  42m53

Ahh that's better! 

Though it still worries me that I'm 3mins off what I regard as fully fit and 4mins off my best!

Think I'll head off to the mountains for a long trail run in the morning.

Max and Lily found some turtle hatchlings. We helped them on their way direct to the lakes 50m from our house.

Morning Lethargy

Fri 5.00am  11KM Roo+ Lake  48m11

Getting slower! Just more steady stuff, hard to get going in the mornings so hopefully this weekend some pm running will assist in bringing back some speed.

Everton V Arsenal

Thurs.   5.00am  11KM Roo+Lake  47m27

Content just to build base endurance. Warm and Humid!

Camping with Reptiles

5.00am  11km  Roo+Lake 47m46

Struggled

101 Push Ups!

Tues 12.30pm  11KM Bridges 43m59

Very humid for Bridges lunchtime run.

This morning I managed 101 push ups! 

Finally got there after about 10 weeks. I'll carry on doing them as the last six were not "good form" as the fatigue crept in and the shake/tremble affected the last few.

Australia Day

9.00pm  Mon.  Roo+Lake 45m45

Beer Mile

Beer Mile

Hats off to all those who competed today, it is the toughest of things to do.

Geoff improved to 2nd this year. Adrian won again - the man is a machine!

Geoff saved his best for last again!

Young Love

Sun 5.00am  17Km Roo+Lake+Roo  1h12m39

5.00am on a Sunday = I must be mad!, Debated with myself whether to wear a singlet or go half naked in the end opted for decency! Wore the Queensland Maroon, it was drenched in sweat very swiftly as the humidity continues unabated. Always wanted to take the run easy and was delighted to feel a lack of pain in the knees as I started off.

I ran past a couple early on by a BBQ shelter. She was sitting on the table he was on the seat. A half bottle of red wine, and I caught a lung of smoke as I past by. Young love I thought, they hadn't gone to bed yet! I wondered if I might see them again as I toured my second lap? Sure enough they were there still only this time he was up on the table and she was down on the seat giving him a blow job! Crikey it was embarrassing as the pathway took me right past them within a couple of feet.

He tried to pull his shorts up and I kept my head looking straight forward though I did give the Runners Wave as an acknowledgement! G'Day ! indeed.

Thought my quads started to tier as the distance went on beyond the hour mark, no real surprise there.

Just before I finished the heavens opened again for another welcome shower. I dived in the pool and Lily who was the only other person up joined me for a swim in the pouring rain - always great fun!

Pete Magill - again!

Resting today, went camping over night back at Mount Mee with Max and Lily. It rained all night but we had a great time. The Temp difference between our place (31.5 0 C ) and the camp site (26.5 0 C) was 5 0 C , nice and cool in the Mountains!

The 3/4 foot long Goanna /Lace Monitor Lizard was still there - gave Lily a fright!

I measured the hill at L' Traverse  in the wagon =  only 1.4KM I thought it was 2KM but I guess its the degree of difficulty that cost all the time when running up it.

I found this thread on the US Runners Message Board. 'Lets Run'

It stars King of the M45 World, Pete Magill, my link is about half way through 10 or so pages of chat but if you scroll the link down you have Pete himself (= "SoCalPete") discussing his life and point of view.It starts off where he is rebutting some "trolls" for having a go at him for training high mileage!

"

Good grief, is this thing still going on?! And I see that it's mostly being kept alive by trolls like Longtimegone who somehow - miraculously, moronically, with the self-awareness of stones at the bottom of a very deep, very dark, very still pond - fail to note the hypocrisy of calling out the pathetic lives of masters runners by (get this ... snicker, snicker) spending their own time posting on running message boards. Trolls, a word of advice: look up the word "pathetic," face mirror, repeat said word aloud as a means of introduction. Life is great. Life is good. And life can be lived a hundred ways. A thousand. And yet still end up good. Anyone out there who carries a checklist and thinks that said checklist is the one and only way to achieve an honorable, fulfilling, enriching, and adrenaline-fueled life, another word of advice: throw away the list. You haven't lived much of a life if you think there is one rule, one path, one answer to the call this world sends out to the living. I hitchhiked the country in my teens. Traveled the world in my early 20s. Owned a rock 'n' roll bar in the Caribbean in my mid-20s. Started up an "online" business before most people knew what an "internet" was. Went broke a half-dozen times before most of the posters on this board were born. Wrote scripts for Hollywood in my 30s. Sold mortgages when my scripts stopped selling in my 40s. Smoked 4 packs of cigarettes at one time of my life. Drank so hard that my hands never stopped shaking from the time I woke up until happy hour. Put so much cola up my nose that I lost my sense of smell for most of a decade. I've made love with more women than most of our young trolls have had kisses - have made love in more countries than our trolls have had birthdays. I've read thousands of books, seen hundreds of movies, attended dozens of plays. And argued politics with socialists in New Zealand, communists in Soho, and Capitalists in France. I've been strip-searched on an airplane runway in India. Nearly raped by crazy Mormons outside of Provo. Shot at with guns. Stabbed. And involved in more fistfights than there are days of the year. I've hung and partied with and been friends with Hollywood stars, renowned poets, famous musicians, mortgage brokers, carpenters, cooks, dishwashers, and bums in the back alleys of Bourbon Street. I've trained 100 miles a week and set masters records. And I've spent days and nights in jails and ERs and the grubbiest places imaginable. And the happiest I've ever been - far happier than at any other time of my life - has been these past few years: running my miles, raising my son, getting a steady paycheck, and waking every day to the promise of a beautiful new day. Those of you who wonder what kind of a life a 40+ year-old can lead when running 100 miles a week ... Well, that made me laugh, because I always wondered what kind of life a young person could lead running that kind of mileage. I wondered how you could trade tasting the juice of life's fruit for the fatigue and monotony of pounding the pavement. But if that's the life a young person wants, so be it. And if this is the life I want, well then excuse me - excuse all of us - if we don't give your counter-advice much credence. Because this is the one thing I know: people who truly live their lives experience a world so large, so filled with variety and possibility and divergent life paths, that they could no more judge the validity of anyone else's life than they could pick a single star in the sky and marvel at only it. I love, admire, and respect all my fellow masters runners - not for their race times or their mileage or their success as parents or employees - but simply because for now, for this one moment, we are all traveling a path together. And if I don't feel that way about the people I'm traveling with, then what does that say about my own journey? No, I choose this path, and I choose to honor the men and women who walk along, ahead, beside, and behind me. It's hard to build a beautiful sand castle on the shore. Any fool can knock one down.

At one point I thought Pete might break into a quote from Roy Batty (Rutger Hauer) from my fave movie Bladerunner, where the Replicant says 

"I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die."

My point is Pete has lived a wondrous and fulfilling life (maybe not the coke & smoke!)  and is still loving it more than ever just running as a 47 year old. 

Ignore the fact that he is one of the best in the World for his age. 

If you have a spare hour, enjoy reading the whole lot from the start.

Grass Verge or Nature Strip

Fri  5.00am  11KM Roo+Lake  45m22

I started off moving OK ! 

The conditions this morning were a continuance of last few days extreme humidity! Thankfully and gratefully received, the heavens finally opened and seemed to cool things down a bit. 

At 5.00am it was 25.5 0 C and 84% Humidity by 6.30am B.O.M. said it was 23.7 0 C and 90% (=Raining!) relative humidity (at Redcliffe).

 Took things relatively easy today still getting the muscles used to running again and also coping with run after run.

75% of the run is on the grass verge (Nature Strip) beside the pathway. Saw a snake this morning , it must have sensed me as it was trying its best to escape !! Unfortunately it appeared to be heading for the lake.

The photo is from the start of last years Beer Mile. I finished 13th, puked twice and had to run an extra lap!

Geoff (3rd) is in Orange, and Adrian (1st) in Yellow, I'm unable to hold a cold stubbie so use my vest. Geoff admires my shorts! 

Running Feet

Thurs  5.00am 11KM Roo+ Lake  43m32

Very humid this morning, sweated buckets! Concentrated on stride length but tried to keep it comfortable without pushing it but didn't quite succeed and went slightly over the top on effort but rewarded with an incredible time for 4th run back and a morning run!

Finished run and was torn between ice on the knee or jump in the pool! In the end opted for ice on the knee. Made a cup of tea and left puddles of sweat on the kitchen floor. Natalie (picture from New Years Eve) always objects to this!

10mins later I jumped in the pool - water temp 28 oC (84 o F) = bliss!

Just been reading this list of the Top10 Dutchmen to play in the English League.

Of course No.1 had to be my All Time No.1 , THE MASTER, King Dennis.

Gives You Hell

Wed 5.00am 11KM Roo+Lake 46m08

Happy with aerobic capacity after the lay off.
IMO The Worlds best M45 Pete Magill recommended the above stretch to me as a possible aid to my knee issues.Finding it slightly difficult with my (frozen)shoulders! but really making a point of doing extra stretching.
Natalie's current favourite song is;

Gives You Hell - The All-American Rejects

Back on the Road

Mon 5.00am 6KM Roo 25m41

Tues 5.00am 6KM Roo 24m36

Knee is 90%

Goodbye To Love - 1972 - Carpenters
Ill say goodbye to love

No one ever cared if I should live or die

Time and time again the chance for love has passed me by

And all I know of love is how to live without it

I just cant seem to find it


So Ive made my mind up

I must live my life alone

And though its not the easy way

I guess Ive always know


Id say goodbye to love

There are no tomorrows for this heart of mine

Surely time will lose these bitter memories

And Ill find that there is someone to believe in

And to live for something I could live for


All the years of useless search

Have finally reached an end

Loneliness and empty days will be my only friend

From this day love is forgotten

Ill go on as best I can


What lies in the future is a mystery to us all

No one can predict the wheel of fortune as it falls

There may come a time when I will see that Ive been wrong

But for now this is my song


And its goodbye to love

Irish Blood English Heart

Irish Blood English Heart - Morrisey

Irish blood, English heart, this I'm made of
There is no-one on earth I'm afraid of
And no regime can buy or sell me

I've been dreaming of a time when
To be English is not to be baneful
To be standing by the flag not feeling
Shameful, racist or partial

Irish blood, English heart, this I'm made of
There is no-one on earth I'm afraid of
And I will die with both my hands untied

I've been dreaming of a time when
The English are sick to death of Labour
And Tories, and spit upon the name of Oliver Cromwell
And denounce this royal line that still salute him
And will salute him forever



So back on 17th Dec 1984 I was at a Test Dept concert at Hammersmith Town Hall! A little later that Winter I went on holiday to Sri Lanka and The Maldives with my mates Gary and John.

The Photo is me atop of Sri Pada or Adams Peak, a famous religious Pilgrimage where devotees climb about 5200 steps up a mountainside to touch a relic which supposedly houses Buddhas footprint!

A tough climb but I would have enjoyed the challenge of running it!

Here are photos of Adams Peak and and my buddy Gary praying at the "footprint" (he tanned easily!)

Nos Galan New Years Eve Road Race

I dipped my hand down a little further into my Tee Shirt draw this morning and pulled out my Test Dept Tee Shirt from 1984! Surely you'd think this Tee would be falling apart by now but it is still in remarkable condition, I'll have to google Test Dept to see if I can get an image or a flavour of their "music". The above image closely resembles the design of my Tee. I'd just left Uni in 84 and was still quite impressionable. Their music was about as avant garde as I got! But even more remarkable is the fact that I have a running Tee Shirt that I think is even older! It was from the Nos Galan New Years Eve Race held at South Welsh mining town Mountain Ash.

Wow see the coincidental design on this mornings Tee Shirt!!! Spookey!

I need to dig it out to to get the date but it is thread bare and has to be treated very gently (hope the wife hasn't thrown it out!). Actually the race that night was a bit of a shambles! I was in a second group and the lead group got mis directed so we became the lead group! I think I was running with the legendary Luton International Tony Simmonds and ended up maybe top 5? I cant remember! Of course a race at midnight on New Years eve would always be something special and this one was special because a whole bunch of my non running mates took the trip with me and Jeff Kaye to take part (Girlfriends also travelled but didn't race!). The Race (if its still going) is always started by a mystery famous runner. The year we ran Kirsty McDermott started us ( I think that's her name - a very good British international 800m runner).

Goodbye Matty Hayden Hello Lance Armstrong!

It's tough getting up at 5.00am just to go for a walk! Still maintaining my 6KM Roo daily! It always seems such a waste of running time! Well only another week of abstinence to go and hopefully that will pass quickly. Very highly motivated to get going again but of course shall be careful not to overdo it! I dare not get on the scales at the moment.

Really interested to see how Lance gets on in his return to competitive cycle racing in the Tour Down Under!

I enjoy the British TV show Life on Mars and I think its funny how America has to remake the show for an American audience! In many ways the show is a reworking of one that I grew up with and really loved - Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased)!!

90 Push Ups

I did 90 push ups yesterday and a session this morning that went;

40, 50, 40, 40, 80 !!

I'm knocking on the door of 100!

12 Hundredths of a Second

12 hundredths of a second ! 

Not  a great deal of time but it was enough time for Dr Jamie Harrison to break my Australian M45 3000m Record at the weekend! In what Jamie told me was his first race as a 45 year old at the weekend Jamie eclipsed my time to record 8m56.32 if only the yellow vested 3rd placer in the photo above had leaned back a little further I'd be OK!! - Big Congratulations to Jamie and I'm sure he will go on to knock more time off it. As I said in a previous post the writing was on the wall with Jamie in such  great shape. Last year he ran 1500m in 4m08 and when you compare that to my paltry 4m18 speed I will not be surprised to see him go under 8m50. Indeed it is an honour to be on the same page as Jamie, as  20 years ago he'd beat me by a country mile. 

He is a 4 time winner of the Australian 10,000m title and compare his City to Surf pedigree 1989 42m26 compared to my 45m55! He is very close to claiming his 300th Road Race Win (I think he is up to win number 294 or there abouts!).

I shall lick my wounds and concentrate on distances where I believe I am better suited.

The M50 5000m record is currently 15m48 (yeah I know I'll have to wait three years!), and the M45 Hour record is 17,785metres and these are do able if I can ever shake off this knee problem!

I just saw this article on the Good Doctor!

 Athletics NSW - Organization License 

Waratah Invitational series - 10/01/2009
Sydney Olympic Park Athletics Centre
Event 22  Men 3000 metre
1 Bromley, Nick                U.T.S. North           8:21.18
2 Harrison, Jason              Parramatta C           8:49.63
3 Harrison, James              Bankstown Sp           8:56.34

Swimming at Rocky Hole

Great Time camping at Mount Mee State Forest!

Noise from the Cockatoos at dawn and dusk was a bit deafening but hi points were;

 night hike, huge lace monitor lizard, swimming at Rocky Hole, Driving the 4WD around the State Forest! - a great father and son bonding session.

I managed to put some of the other tracks into perspective for future runs and to describe them as long and mountainous would be accurate!

Geoff, cant wait till we can L'Traverse together!

Mount Mee

Lots of walking! Doing the 6KM Roo loop most days!

I saw a Koala yesterday - the first in a long while but didn't have a camera or phone to take any photos! Normally running I have my head down (Looking out for toads and snakes!)

This morning I did have my camera and came across two Roos bouncing along in front of me so took a short video!

The lack of running does have a positive side - this morning I was able to walk down the stairs in a normal forward motion rather than going backwards (= easier on the knees!)

Today I'm off to Mount Mee for a couple of days camping with Max - It's a real hot day here but up in the mountains it should be cooler!

Made it up to 78 Push Ups!