I headed back out to the Stromlo Running Festival at 5.30am this morning to run in the 30km Lightning Strike run. The course was different to previous years and I loved it. There was a pretty even amount of uphill and downhill, and great variation in the running surface from dirt trail to long grass to rocky bits. There were also several river crossings. Two of them were deep and the water was running rapidly. Vanity's Crossing in particular was a challenge. The water level was almost up to my waist and flowing with gusto. The race marshalls got us to wade across it by linking arms with other runners and going across in 2s and 3s so none of us got washed over the edge and downstream. Martin F and I ran the first ~20km together and even our combined body weight wasn't enough to stop us being dragged along by the water at Vanity's. Thankfully, another solidly built runner came along and linked arms with both of us, acting as our anchor.
I ran steady today but not fast. It wasn't a race to me; just a long training run in a nice place, and a good opportunity to have a long chat with Martin.
It's been a solid enough weeekend of running for me. It would be great to have another weekend about now so I could catch up on all the weekend chores that I haven't yet started.
3 comments:
You have had a great weeekend. Well done!
I'd like to run that one next year - sounds fun with the river crossings. More than 6' - there you're not worried about being washed downstream!
Thanks Speedygeoff. You and the other Speedy Geese had good running w'ends too. I think this year the Stromlo Running Festival started to come of age. I really hope it continues even though this year was the third and final of its initial funding. Some lobbying may be in order ...
The 30km Lightning Strike run is awesome Ewen. The Stromlo Running Festival organisers promote it as a last good hitout opportunity pre 6ft track and it's definitely that. If I had better navigation skills and a better memory I'd run it in training some time just for the training benefit.
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