Lost and Longest Run of the year

As of this week, Steven and I have lived here in North Sydney for 4 months. I've done countless runs around our neighbourhood, often venturing outside my regular run routes and discovering new parks. 

Still, my favourite run is my "same old same old" route. It is essentially a bush-walk / trail-run route that goes through Berry's Reserve, through Oyster's Bay, and a loop around Ball's Head Reserve. 

Yet, as I set out today to do this run, somehow my brain managed to turn itself "off" (as if it's ever "on"!) and....

I got lost, and somehow managed the longest run ever to record on my Garmin, which means it's the longest run I've done this year. HUZZAH! 

I've also discovered some new MEAN hills on this route, and I loved it! I went out feeling really strong and ran my energy all out. 

I'm probably not going to qualify for any crazy races with these speeds, but I'm definitely improving, both in speed and distance.

You can see where I got my water / walk break at Mile 3. The water fountain is at the bottom of a hill, which was scary to speed down; it's like at 90 degrees. I decided to walk back up for fear of killing my glutes / puking up all the water I just drank. 

Do you know that feeling of coming home, hot, sweaty, tired, thirsty, and taking that first gulp of icy cold Gatorade? Cue angels singing "Hallelujah"! I might have to seriously begin thinking about bringing water/gatorade on my runs with me; if only I didn't hate carrying things while I run.

After a sweet, hot shower, I got on my new Pro Compression socks. I got the extra smalls this time, and they still fit perfectly.

Lunch was an omlette with all the random odds and ends in the fridge (eggplant, tomatoes, haloumi cheese, and thai basil that I'll be using forever; why can't they sell smaller bunches of herbs?!).

Now I'm hankering for an afternoon snack of some sort, like a Chocolate Cake or cookie or something. I might go out for some later, but Lazy has got a tight grip on me right now, so I absolutely cannot leave the couch. 

After 2 weeks without running hills, I got schooled

Since I've joined the gym, I've been enjoying the lower impact treadmill runs immensely. As such, I haven't pounded the neighbourhood pavement in a while. My legs have completely forgotten about the hills.. Oh, the hills...

Today, I took both Garmin and Run Keeper out for a bit of a comparison.

Garmin said this:

Run Keeper said this:

Garmin said:
3.50 miles in 40:12 minutes with an average pace of 11.29 minutes/mile

Run Keeper said:
3.42 miles in 38:55 minutes with an average pace of 11:23 minutes/mile

As you can see, there is really hardly any difference between the two, just the time it took for me to take my cell phone out of my pocket and stop Run Keeper while gasping like a asthmatic 90-year-old. So I'm pretty happy with using Run Keeper whenever Garmin's satellites cannot be found.

Run Keeper isn't good enough to make me put away my Garmin for good, however. Not only is Garmin lighter than my cell phone, but it's also less bulky. I track my runs on Garmin Connect, so switching to Run Keeper would be way too much work.

After my run, I put on my new Nike Training Club app and attempted the Kickin' It 30 minute workout with the morning news in the background.

 I think I made it to 20 minutes, and then I couldn't take any more burn in my thighs.

 Now I'm just chillin' in front of our beloved space heater.

Sydney doesn't get cold enough for central heating, so we have this little space heater. You can stand in front of it and watch your skin blister, or step out of it's heat ray and freeze. As a compromise, I have it mostly facing away from me, and I'll walk in front of it every once in a while.

What are your plans for the day?

Garmin failed me, but I took my run into Unexplored Territory!

It was hard to get started today.

I wheedled and whined, caw-caw-ed and barked (even maybe howled), but I finally got off my butt and went for a run.

At 1:30 PM, I set my Garmin to find my location (like it hasn't found it a bazillion times before).

Apparently, cloudy days makes Garmin sad and confused.

By 1:46, I had decided that Garmin could suck it, downloaded and installed Runkeeper, and was on my way.

I decided to take a new route. Now that I had my phone with me, I wouldn't worry too much about getting lost. I came across a beautiful church.

As I ran along, Runkeeper kept speaking at me in her sweet dulcet tones: "10 minutes, 1.29 miles, average pace blah blah blah"... It was nice to know my stats as I went along!

It also had a nice camera shortcut inside the Runkeeper app, so I didn't have to close Runkeeper to take a picture.

I ran two loops around St Leonard's park, which was full of school kids doing some sort of activity/ athletic competition day.

Runkeeper uses Google maps, which is nice and accurate. (found GPS signals quite quickly, too!)

This is what the screen looks like on my Sony Xperia phone (which really isn't the best smart phone on the market today, but good enough for its price).

I did a total of 3.13 miles in 35:44.

By the time I got home, Garmin was sitting by the window like he was in Time Out for being naughty. But when I turned him around to look at his face, he simply showed the time and date as if nothing had happened...as if I hadn't asked him to find some satellites...as if he hadn't failed me...

Anyway, I think I'll keep Runkeeper around for those cloudy days when Garmin is being a dunce.

Do you use Runkeeper? Do you run with a GPS watch or your phone?

Brisbane Kangaroo Point oh-bloody-pain run

Is it that time again?

OH YES IT IS!

Run time!!

This evening, I took my Garmin out on the Brissy town.

When we first got to Brisbane, I was amazed by how many walking/running/biking trails there were all over the city.

They even made 3 specific paths for a shorter run (red, 3.39 km), a longer one (blue, 6.47 km), and the longest (green, 8 km).

In my non-running condition, I decided to do none of these. Just go as far as I could along the river to Kangaroo Point.

The running path seemed awesome when I first started.

Designated pathway for bikes vs. runners.

Beautiful river to the left, arbour pathway to the right.

Eventually the cliffs appeared to my right. Lots of local rock-climbing groups use these cliffs as practice. You can sort of see two people standing at the top. I think they climbed up there. Or they're climbing down. Not really sure. 

In any case, they're definitely having more fun that I was, fighting the wind today!

These Brisbane-ers are really healthy. 

The paths were busy with runners/walkers and I saw plenty of this along the way--outdoor boot camps! These guys were kicking and punching on a giant chessboard (I think?) in front of Kangaroo Cliffs. 

This was the view from the Kangaroo Cliffs looking out at Brisbane River. Awesome sunset that my crappy iPhone didn't really get. Sorry! 

By the time I was running home, I could really feel my knees and the blisters on my feet. I'm in no running form, and the hard concrete path didn't help either. 

My sad, sad stats: 

27.24 minutes

2.77 miles

9:53 min/mile average

Not exactly a stellar run, but every run counts, even the sad ones, right? 

Walking isn't cardio, Steven

Steven and I spent this past weekend at Surfers Paradise (yes, they don't have very good grammar sometimes here Down Under). 

One of my heart challenges from my sister was to jog 5K up a mountain, 5K on a beach, 5K in a desert and 5K in a city. 

Well, there was plenty of beach at Surfers Paradise! 

My stats: 

21:51

2.18 miles or 3.5 KM

10:02 min/ mile

The verdict: 

Running on sand is bloody PAINFUL. 

My feet, toes, calves, ankles, front of shins, back of shins, insides of shins... everything HURT for days after my run. My feet still feel sore and stiff! 

This is not the work of 2.18 miles... it feels worse than 10K, and it's all because of the shifty sand underfoot. It doesn't help that I run barefoot either! 

Later, Steven and I were on the bus and this happened:

Steven: "I feel like we got a good cardio workout in with all our walking."

(We walked from Surfers Paradise to Broadbeach, just in case you wanted to stalk me with Google Maps or something creepy/sweet like that.)

Sandy: "Walking isn't cardio, Steven."

Steven: LOL "The look on your face when you said that. Let's recreate it and take a picture so you can blog about how silly I am."

That's a totally true conversation absolutely word-for-word it really is.

Later, back in Surfers Paradise, we found Yoghurt City, a self-serve yogurt bar like Menchies or Yogurty's back home.

Unfortunately, the people in the joint never heard of mochi balls.

Aussie-land, YOU MUST LEARN ABOUT THE MAGICAL DELICIOUSNESS OF MOCHI.

YOU MUST!

We got an assortment of fruits and candies and dried banana pieces, which was really all that appealed to us out of their small selection of toppings.

The yogurt (we got a mix of passionfruit and green apple) lost its taste once we added the fruits and banana. This is where Menchies is the KING! Their yogurt manages to stay tasty and tart through the toppings.

Steven rates Yoghurt City 2 and 1/2 kangaroo kicks out of 5.

Don't kick kangaroos. Stay in school.

Byron Bay Lighthouse hike

Last week, Steven and I visited a suburb near Byron Bay, a popular surf/vacation/resot town. 

One of the highlights of our trip was the Byron Bay lighthouse hike. 

The views were so jaw-dropping that our jaws literally dropped and we had to pick them back up, dust them off, and surgically sew them back into our faces.

To get to the lighthouse, we took a 20 minute bike ride.

So, you see, we started off already tired.

The winding, little residential streets took a steep uphill at some points, so we got off our bikes and walked it (don't judge me, it was a HUGE hill!). 

At the start of the walk (and throughout), we got lots of signs and notes.

Already, from the height of the start of the trail, you can look down and see the entire Byron Bay.

Water dragon alert!

 There were a LOT of steps! Great cardio workout. There were even people running this loop. Our host calls this path their local gym.

The trail reaches the most easterly point of the Australian mainland. Sorry for the face...sun in eye. I was also worried about losing the sun, and having to bike home in the dark.

Which we did.

Scary.

This was definitely one of the most beautiful hikes I've ever done.

The lighthouse is by FAR the most beautiful lighthouse either Steven or I have seen. Very well kept, pristine, beautiful lands and structure. A really amazing hike.

I put on my Garmin so my sister could Garmin-Connect-stalk me. Here are the stats:

Bike to lighthouse walk:
23 min
3.38 miles

Hike:
51:16 min
2.19 miles

Bike home:
16:59 min
2.51 miles
(because we walked into town for dinner, and biked from there)

Run: Blurry Garmin Photos

I did it. I ran.

And it felt GOOD!

In order to keep all the gains I've had recently in Ashtanga (not only bound Mary D, but friggin' half lotus twice on my bum knee!) I had several goals this run.

1) Play with Jen's Garmin:

I put it by the door, which must be made out of lead because it couldn't find a satellite for a good 15 mins. So, I moved it next to the window in the living room, and it got it in 2 minutes.

Keeping track of the distance I'd already covered made it easy to...

2) Stay under 1 mile:

Sorry for messing with your eyes.

Here's what it says:

Time: 8:22:7
Distance: 1.34 km or 0.83 miles
Pace: 6:15 min/km or 10:03 min/mile
Calories: 98

Just as I got home, I started to feel less hyperventilate-y and my legs felt like they finally found a pace. It sucks that I have to keep my runs under 1 mile because 1 mile feels like a warm up. I really hope that working up my mileage slowly will allow me to keep my flexibility in my hips, and pain out of my knees.

Staying under 4 miles a week will be worth it in the long run when I'm both a superstar runner and a rockstar Ashtangi.

Patience and determination.

Yo.

Gifts galore!

This month has been hard on the wallet.

It's not only a month of birthdays, but in a few weeks, Steven and I will be on an airplane to Australia for a year.

That's a long time.

That's a Christmas, a New Years, a whole year of birthdays and weddings and things we'll miss.

So I got my sister this:

She's already run with it a couple of times. She says the GPS is really, really slow to load, so she hasn't actually used the GPS function of it yet (WHICH WAS THE WHOLE POINT AGGHHHH GARMIN!!!)

I got Steven a bunch of stuff for his birthday yesterday.

It started with a travel pack: Visine, floss, lip balm, toilet seat covers, hand wipes.

Then, sunscreen for his delicate baby's bottom skin, and underwear.

Because all of that makes sense together. Right?

The piece de resistance:

A waterproof camera! 

Steven was surprised. When he first brought up the idea of a waterproof camera, I played it really cool.

Steven: I think a waterproof camera is a good idea! We'll be in and out of water, traveling, you know. It might be good to have a camera that can take the abuse.

Me: Nooo, it's too expensive. I have a waterproof casing for one of my film cameras. We can just use that.

Steven: But I'm sure we can find it for cheap on kijiji or something.

Me: Bad idea. Don't waste your money.

Steven got the most badass cake for his birthday ever.

Those cupcakes are glued onto the mini cake with frosting.

Whomever thought of this is genius.

In other news, Two-Two got a hair cut:

Big Brown Eyes.

:)