11 km Beach Run

Today was the 11 km run we had been training for this run since we moved into our Wardli's. The morning of the run, i woke up a little bit before my alarm clock went up (around 6:00 am). I then came to realise that outside was a storm of rain. The wind seemed strong and the rain sounded heavy. When i arose from my bed i quickly got changed and then went outside to see the weather. The rain was heavy and the sky was dark and full of cloud. In my mind i was hoping that we would not have to run in the rain but i knew i was dead wrong.

I then took my water bottle and my jumper to the tunnel of where we finished and then scrambled through the rain to get to our bus. It was very cold as we waited for others to board. We set off in the bus and after a 10 minute drive we arrived at Hardwicke Bay. We jumped out the bus to step in sock-deep puddles of water and extremely heavy rain. We sprinted to the starting line on the beach, avoiding channels of rushing water down the slopes. Hobbsy got us all lined up and continued to tell us how this is what we had been training for and for us to push our hardest. We just listened as we were doing star-jumps to keep up warm. Our clothes were soaked and dripping cold water, but all we knew is that we had to intimidate Hobsy.

For the night before the run, the group had a talk of a deal or a bet. For on the day we drive back on the bus, Dale said we would be stopping at a BP. Four people were selected and agreed to challenge him, they were Jack O'Brien, David La Pietra, Dan Fahey-Sparks and Lachlan Delbridge. The bet was that if one of the four beat Dale, we could buy two items from the BP, if two people won, 3 items could be bought, then 5 items and if all beat him we could buy as many items as possible. Although the trick was that if they all lost to Dale, no items could be bought and we would have to watch the teachers eat... this could not happen!

So as we talked to Dale about his age and not having heart attacks, we started the race. My estimated time for myself was around an hour. I began the run very slow and at the middle of the group. As i saw the usual leading pack charge off, i attempted to get myself in to a slow but steady rythm. For i did not really care about my time, i gave myself a goal of not stopping and i intended to acheive that goal. During the run i was isolated from the group and i saw the odd person or two charge past me. I was not running as fast as usual which i was quite dissapointed about. Suprisingly the physical barriers that usually attack me did not, my legs felt tired although i had the energy to persue on.

The issue that most people had with the run was the mental state they were in, not thinking about the run and letting your legs do the thinking. Suprisingly i thought of many things that took the finish line off my mind, i was daydreaming for the majority of the run. I thought this was very good, i was not experiencing a great deal of pain and i actually found most of the run fairly easy. Nevertheless there were some points at the three and five km marks where my physical state was being questioned by my mental state. Although i thought i ran very well and consistant. I felt i could have done better, i could have set a faster pace for myself, although i sped up at sometimes i thought that i could have maintained that pace. Although i did not, i slowed down for reasons that i still find unknown. I could blame it on the slight headwind we encountered at the start, or the softish sand that we ran on, or the heavy rain the was smashing us in the face. But in the end it was not my persistance that let me down, just my understanding of how fast is too fast and how slow is too slow.

We ran all the way from Hardwicke Bay back to Point Turton (Wambana). I finished the run in seventy-seven minute or one hour and seventeen minutes. I was proud i ran the whole way without stopping but i think i could have run faster.