This past weekend, Julia, Jared and I headed to Canberra for a half marathon and to see a bit of the city. We got lost on the way there, going down to Kiama, which is still right on the coast instead of heading inland at the same time as going south, so we ended up taking about twice as long to get there. The drive was REALLY scenic though and we got to drive through the mountains and get some amazing views.
Canberra is COOOOOOOOOOLD. It's inland a bit so it's about 8 or so degrees cooler than where we are in Wollongong. We got in around 1PM, dropped off our stuff in the room, had a quick bite to eat and then went out to where we had to go in the morning for the race. It's an easy city to drive in and kinda fun. Lots of big buildings everywhere but also very nice with parks and big trees. Kinda reminded me of Ottawa, a typical government city. We saw the race area and then headed back towards the hotel with a stop at the IGA for some milk and bread. Back at the hotel we chilled out for a bit, ate again and then went out for a little walk. We were staying at this hotel that is right on the Australian National University's campus. We walked around the campus and went into the library to check it out. We also found this big ole party going on at one of the residence buildings where everyone was wearing indian costumes. Neat!
Back at the hotel we just chilled out, chatted, watched a movie and then hit the sac nice and early. It was all setting up for a good race day.
We were up at 5 and went through all the normal race day morning activities. We left around 7:50AM to head down to the race start to find parking and warm-up. Warm-up and was good and I was excited for the race start. We lined up near the front of the start and the gun went off and we all said goodbye. I went ahead and got into a good rhythm just staying around people that were in and around the pace I wanted. At about 2k I felt a little pinch in my quad so I tried a few things while running to work it out, but it wouldn't go away. It was just getting worse. By the time 4k came around it was pretty painful and then by the 4.5k mark I knew I could kiss the PB time goodbye. I had to stop, it was just too much. I pulled over and tried to stretch it out but it was SO painful. After a bout 30 seconds or so I saw Jared blow by and thought WOW he's running WELL! Hope he can keep that up! Soon after I saw Jubes and she convinced me NOT to quit and to just go slow and see how it feels. Well I figured the further away I go the less of a chance there will be to bail (a good thing) so I just went slow. I'd have to stop periodically and stretch/walk for a bit as it was just too much. I finally hobbled in at around the 1:53 mark. SO PAINFUL! Jared killed the race in 1:38 and Jubes kicked some ass with a 1:50 in her first ever half.
It's time for me to forget about that race and get fit for the marathon. It may take a week or so to fully rehab this leg but hopefully I can get in some quality training in cycling or swimming and some weights while the running legs get fixed.
School is good right now too. I just found out my last two marks for one class and all things considered, I finished with an 80.5%! Not half bad! Now this week I have to finish one paper for another class, finish a science animation thing for Tuesday and I have a presentation next Wednesday. Then two more papers due in the following weeks. oyvé!
Tunes and I also discussed how we're going to go about saving for travel. Basically, my work covers rent, and then she pulls in about another $450 per week. So we're going to take $300 of that right away and put it away for saving and then what's left over we'll put towards groceries and try and save anywhere else.
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