Collecting personal bests

This week has seen a collection of running personal bests coming Annalie's way.

On Sunday she'd decided to pop over to Masterton in the Wairarapa to take part in a 10k race. It was only her second at this distance so she was confident that she'd beat her original time.

Her colleague is an experienced triathlete so she had a personalised plan written. It was only for three weeks, so rather a lot shorter than a proper plan would be, but it was something to focus on.

Although going in rested, Annalie made the fatal mistake of not taking her camelback and getting a bit dehydrated (it was hotter over there than in Welly). But she still achieved her goal of being in the 51s. Just. The watch said 55 seconds. But the official time was 59.

The second PB came on Tuesday night. Annalie had never taken part in the Waterfront 5k, mainly due to it clashing with football. But this week she was roped into it for work, promising to be running mate for the CE.

Turns out he didn't need it, as he flew off. But Annalie was determined to beat her Parkrun best of 24:41. She's been trying to surpass that each week but to no avail, getting within 5 seconds but not close enough.

The waterfront event is a faster course so she thought she'd be in with a good chance of beating out. With a few people to focus on, she was able to push herself through and shave a whopping 32 seconds off! The watch was off again, this time it was 4 seconds over. She was obviously too glad to finish to stop her watch in time!

The PBs just get harder to achieve now though. But it's probably back to half marathon training now. Round the Bays is looming in February. And there's a PB to beat there too :-)

Going round the forest this time

It would appear that the Round the Bays run wasn't a one-off for either of us.

This past weekend we headed up the coast to Waitarere to participate in the Great Forest run. Annalie managed to win a free entry into the half marathon via Twitter, so we headed off in The Bach to revisit the campsite we'd stayed at for our first night of campervan ownership.

With a range of distances to choose from, Ian decided to plump for a 5km sprint. Given that he's recovering from a hamstring injury, he didn't want to push it.

Annalie set off first at 9am. This time there was nobody to keep her company or stop her running too fast. The game plan was set to beat 2 hours 10 minutes, hoping to shave around 5 mins off her RTB time.

Her lack of running conscience buddy showed though, as she completed the course in under 2 hours! A goal she wasn't aiming for until the Wellington half marathon in June. Oh well. She'll just have to set another goal for then.

She finished just in time to see Ian off for the start of his race at 11.30. Waving him off with good luck in his ears, she thought she had about 25 minutes' respite before he crossed the line. 21 minutes later, a familiar figure crested the final hill and Ian sprinted for the finish line.

Even more impressive than a 21-minute finish time was the fact that he was placed 17th overall! Not bad when you consider he was up against club runners too. His biggest gripe was that 8 girls beat him!

Yes there are more runs in the pipeline, so this blog may now take on an additional agenda of updating you on our progress too! But having The Bach means we have so much flexibility, allowing us to combine our tiki tours around NZ with our newly emerged hobby!