The Horrie and Belinda Show

14/8/05

Yet another picture perfect day greeted us for this great race. Can anybody remember the last time it rained on City 2 Surf?

Enjoyed the later start than the usual early time we get up to do our training runs. We even had time for breakfast, which is something we don't usually do before a run. We drove to Bronte and did a nice leisurely 6km run into the city as a warmup. Picked up our numbers before trying to find Team Bear Cottage, which we were unable to do. We did see Psychoma who was not running due to ITB problems. Ran around to the domain toilets to avoid the queues to the Portaloos in Hyde Park. (Thanks for the tip Action)

We then casually joined the start about 5 minutes before the gun went off and lined up at the back of the A1 pack. I can't tell you how good it felt to do this compared to what I have had to do in the past to get a decent starting position.

We were so relaxed, the starting gun caught us by surprise and off we went. After walking and shuffling for about 100 metres, we were then into our stride and on our way to Bondi. The pre-race warmup enabled Belinda to settle into her stride easily and she was moving quite quickly right from the start. We could see Tim Turner up ahead as we began the climb to Edgecliff after his effort doing 12 Foot Track yesterday. We eventually caught him as we were running through Rose Bay. I asked him how he was feeling after his huge effort yesterday and he admitted he was doing it tough. I told him I would have been doing it tough to get of bed after running 90km of tough trails the day before. We started to pull away from him until we got to Heartbreak Hill where he caught us and went past us while I was doing a mid-race report through to http://www.coolrunning.com.au/podcasts/index.shtml. We reached the half way point in just over 40 minutes so were on track for the sub 80 I thought Belinda had in her. We continued the climb up Heartbreak Hill and enjoyed the change to downhill after we hit the Old South Head turnaround. We went past Tim as we turned into Military Rd. There are 2 nasty little hills in this section and Belinda started to struggle with her breathing here and started to lose some form. However, a little slow down and a quick drink fixed things. After we hit the 10km mark, Belinda was back into her stride again and really running well. We went past JD, Superflake, Gronk and the Cool Running Cheer Squad just before we hit the beach. I was very confident of hitting the sub 80 here but once we hit the flat for that run up Cambpell Parade, I could feel Belinda slowing down or more her inability to stay with me as I tried to wind the pace up. Then she dropped her MP3 player. So trying to pick that up without being bowled over by all the runners behind us was enough of a challenge before she dropped a drink bottle while doing this. We picked both things up before finishing off with the best burst she could muster as we hit Queen Elizabeth Drive. As we were heading to the finish, Tim somehow found some pace in what by this point must have felt like legs of lead and went past us again. We finished in 79:18 so the sub 80 was achieved. Belinda was rapt and enjoyed the run immensely.

It was then great to catch up with Cool Runners and Striders afterwards. Great to see Aunty Karin out running again and as always great to catch up with Cool Runners from out of town. Got to catch up with Lucky Legs and Flash Duck again as well as meeting Wobbly Man for the first time. We then went down the Team Bear Cottage Corporate Tent and picked up our T-Shirts before enjoying the coastal walk back to Tamarama before heading uphill to pick up our car.