Tales of Trails, Mountains and Rocky Roads

So, I finished 2nd lady at Edmonton Marathon but in all honesty, I don't feel like I deserved the $975 winnings that I walked away with. I'd be a liar if I said I wasn't chuffed to finish 2nd, but I was 15 minutes behind the winning lady, and I was a little disappointed with my time of 3.06.55 - just 30 seconds slower than Calgary Marathon back in May. Then, I was ecstatic with my time, but having gone through half way at Edmonton in 1.31 and been 2 minutes up on the half way point in Calgary, I really thought I could get closer to the 3 hour mark. I guess it just goes to show that with a marathon, no matter how well your prep has gone, things can still go pear shaped when you finally get round to the race. Training had gone well in recent weeks, I'd been feeling fit, and with Edmonton been described as "flat and fast", I thought this would be it. The only difference was that I hadn't done any 10k races recently which were the confidence boosters for Ca...

For once, I guess I knew what to expect at the 5 Peaks Trail Race at Fish Creek Park – a magnificent course with plenty of technical single track trails, incorporating as many ups and downs as possible, and definitely the “wow!” factor in terms of “are we really in the middle of a city that is home to over a million people?!” I’ve spent many hours running around Fish Creek since my move overseas last year, but even I was not aware of the hidden gems that course director and friend, Alan Lam, came up with. Fish Creek really is his backyard, and I take my hat off to Alan for the choice of course which certainly showed Fish Creek at its best. I’d decided to do the race to see how I faired off-road, particularly with some major trail races coming up, and whilst I knew it wouldn’t be the greatest “race sharpener” for a road marathon next weekend, it certainly wouldn’t do me any harm getting a good hours run in under race conditions. The course was originally meant to have been...

It’s hard to believe that it's almost mid-August and with 3 major races looming on the horizon, I really am in the thick of my training at the moment. Although I’m excited and have clear goals in mind, it’s also quite daunting as I try to balance training and recovery to ensure I’m in tip-top shape for each of them, and that I don’t peak too early. The marathon requires speed endurance and so I’ve been focusing on tempo runs and longer reps on the roads to prepare myself for Edmonton on August 25 th . I’d love to get a season’s best time, and with a flatter course at a slightly lower altitude than Calgary, I’m hoping things will work in my favour. But I also have to tell myself that Edmonton was never really a target race for me, having only entered at the last minute due to the cancellation of my other target races – I just needed a long distance event, so to some degree I'm feeling quite relaxed about it. Likewise with my 100km race two weeks later. I’d initially entered...