Blog

Graham, our Run Zone club chairman, has a thing about the word “just”. A typical conversation with him after a club or time trial run would go like this: Graham: “Well done! How far did you run?” Me: “Just 5 (or whatever other distance) km today.” Graham: “It is never JUST 5 km! Well done!” But it gives me great pleasure to say that today’s run was JUST 21 km (actually it was a few hundred metres short, but let’s not get stuck on technicalities). The word “just” means that I have worked so hard that I can claim 21 km as being well within my capabilities. I have the fitness, the strength and the endurance to run 21 km, it is only my right foot that is holding me back on pace — and that I am trying to work on as best I can. ...

Who am I? I always start answering this question by saying that I am a software engineer, a happily married mother of four, an avid runner and the author of two books. That is more or less the order these things occurred in: software engineer, married, mother, runner, author. But those are things that I do. They are not who I am. So, if I take all of those out of the equation, who am I really? ...

And it is a wrap! What an incredible three days of running. Thank you RunZone and especially Graham Block. Day 1 - 30 km This was the race I needed to push myself in the most. I’ve never run 30 km, but we heard rain forecasts for the weekend, and I wanted to have the extra 10 km to play with if necessary. Day 2 - 20 km This was the most challenging route of the three days. If I never run this route again, it will be too soon. I could also feel the previous day’s 30 km and it was difficult to push through. ...

I always push myself during our running club’s Wednesday afternoon time trial. The time trial from two Wednesdays ago was no different. I pushed and pushed some more; I ran my heart out. Yet my watch recorded a disappointing 38m 17s — more than two minutes slower than the former time I ran it! Back at our clubhouse I reluctantly filled in my time on our leaderboard sheet. Our club chairman spotted me and asked, “How did your run go?” ...