Good Run W/E

Last weekend I had two of my most enjoyable for quite a while.

On Saturday I ran from my house towards the beach which is not unusual as I spend a lot of my running at the beach. I decided to warm up on my way to the beach and then do a 3km effort down the beach. The tide was low meaning the sand was hard and I put in 3km in about 3:40 min/km. From there I kept running a further kilometre and decided to exit the beach on a beach track that I’d never decided to go down before, this took me to the edge of my local golf course. Being early in the morning I decided to run through the golf course not expecting there was anyone playing golf just yet. It’s a nice picturesque course and it was enjoyable to run through the manicured lawns until there was a couple of groups of people playing. I managed to run to the edge of the course and avoid getting hit with a golf ball. From there a few kilometres more over the road till home and i had managed a 10km run with a 3km beach effort and run through the golf course to start my weekend.

Following day I had scheduled my virtual run for the Indigenous Marathon Foundation. this foundation teaches young aboriginal people about running and changes the lives of many who are seemingly stuck in a cycle of poverty, alcohol or domestic violence that they can change their lives with the power of running. At our event we were lucky enough to have one of their graduates join us who has changed his life through running and managed to run five international marathons all in good time. I had registered for a half marathon distance event, we had our running club set up a course with an undulating terrain over road and gravel through the local state forest. Temperature was close to 30 degrees celsius for the run meaning conditions were tough. This was not a race, it was a group of people running together for a good cause. I managed to run this course in 1hr 40 min which was a tough but enjoyable pace for a tough half marathon course in tough conditions.

I ran both these runs in my Gladsoles sandals, which I am doing almost all my running in currently. During this half marathon about half the course is over gravel road, when running over this terrain in sandals occasionally you can land on the ball of your foot on a sharp rock and you can feel some pain due to the minimalist style of the sandal. This possibly happened 20 times during this run (not a lot over 10km) and interestingly and coincidently every time on my left foot. Afterwards I have some slight bruising on the ball of my left foot. Nothing too intense that will stop me running.

Overall a great weekend of running, a mix of beach and bush and some great company to run a half marathon with. Enjoy your running.