As Willie Nelson would say....

Let's just get my rant for the day out of the way to begin with -

This thread appeared on CR today. Maybe it's just me but IMHO the Kokoda Track isn't something to be raced. It's the scene of one of Australia's most important and perhaps least known military victories. Many people (on both sides of the battle) fought & died there. For that reason, it's not just any old trail (dare I say it, like Six Foot). Maybe I feel this way because several of my relatives fought in PNG (including both my grandfathers). Maybe because my pop died of the malaria he contracted while serving in PNG in WWII. The idea of conducting, let alone participating in, a race on the Track is absolutely abhorrent to me.

But then again, I would like to trek it one day. Although I think of my plans to trek it as a mark of respect, perhaps there is no difference between that & 'racing' it. Perhaps that makes me a hypocrite. Dunno. Doesn't really matter. But let's just say it's not on my list of "events to do before I die".

Ok, now that I've got that off my chest, back to a happier topic -

Well, if ever you get bored of running around the local streets, here's a tip - do most of your runs on an oval (with a circumference of about 350m) for a period of 2 weeks. Then head back out on the road. Sheer bliss.

Today's plan was 10mins on the oval to warm up and then out onto the road, following part of the Mini-Mos course, for a further 35mins at about 6.30min/km pace. My legs were pretty rusty today - tired & heavy (as they always are after a rest day - I have no idea why) and there was quite a bit of tightness in my lower legs, particularly my left. Hopefully a bit of stretching & self-massage over the next few days will do the trick. Still, I was away from the oval and on the road admiring all the beautiful flowers which have blossomed early so I can't complain. Finished with 7.04kms in 45:28mins (aver 6:28mins/km pace).

It's funny that after spending so much time on the oval recently, today was my first possum sighting for the season. In the space of 10mins I saw not 1 but 2. One was sitting on the fence surrounding the oval watching me. Needless to say, s/he got bored very quickly & soon left ;-) It wont be long now until the now-standard black-outs start happening in the 'hood as the possums start going places they shouldn't (like electricity sub-substations). I think last year we had almost 1 black-out per week. That's a lot of dead possums.

Alas, work has started flooding in again after a week or so of relative quiet so it was no great surprise that I wasn't able to make it out of the office tonight in time to get to pilates. Oh well, I enjoyed my double training session days while they lasted. However I have plans for the weekend that will, I think, more than make up for missing pilates - Stay tuned :-)

MTD: 75.19kms