Ottawa Race Weekend

Ottawa Race Weekend is almost here. I've been really quiet on the blog lately but if you follow me on Twitter or FaceBook, you will know that I suffered another respiratory infection about three weeks ago, this time a Pneumonia. I got a new treatment of antibiotics and it seems to have cleared up quite well. I ran on Sunday and again on Tuesday and today so I'm feeling up to the challenge of a Half Marathon.

My race plan is not to race :) I will enjoy the new route and spectate as I run through some of Ottawa's most interesting neighborhoods. I am not expecting a PR, not even close. I hope to squeak in under 1h50m but even then if I don't meet that goal I won't be sad.

If you are in Ottawa let me know through a tweet, comment or FaceBook message. I'm having a pasta dinner at my place on Saturday and we could meet up before the race, I always enjoy meeting fellow bloggers.

As I plan the rest of my year, I'm looking back at this blog and wondering what to do with it. I really enjoyed sharing my training journey with you guys but time is getting really short here between all the various pressures of life. I will try to keep the blog alive, at least for race reports and some more general observations about running but I do not think it' s possible for me to produce the number of posts I used to. Thanks for being readers throughout the year and cheering me through some difficult times and I hope I was able to share some of my success and joy with you all. I suggest you follow me on Twitter or become my friend on FaceBook if you want to be kept up to date with my training. I will be picking a fall marathon (maybe tomorrow at the Expo if there are good deals) and will be planning to break my 3h19m time then. Hopefully I can BQ and/or BG (Boston Guarantee, it's a new term I made up, I should write an entry about that some day) which would be a BQ - 20 minutes to make sure I can be one of the first to register.

Ready for Montreal!

First of all, I apologize for being so quiet lately. If you are my friend in real life or even on FaceBook, you will know that I have been going through some changes over the last few months that culminated over the last 4 weeks, the most significant one being my return to being single. It's allowed me to refocus my priorities and objectives and devote lots of time to my training. I'm actually doing great given the circumstances and have a positive outlook on life and beyond! Now that this is out of the way, let's talk about the good news!

I feel very much ready for Montreal. I believe I can get a new PR and probably even break 1:40 if I am having a good day. Yesterday's training was a regular speed 10k with a 2km speed test thrown in there that was meant to confirm my confidence about this weekend's half marathon. I ran with my friends from the Ottawa FrontRunners. Let me rephrase that, I met with the FrontRunners and Mark and I went ahead and left everyone else in our dust ;)

While I had warned Mark that I would speed up for a 2km interval at the middle of our run, he was caught by surprise when I darted off. To my surprise, he caught up with me and didn't even feel winded. We'll have to be rougher on him in the future, he is definitively under training. The 2km went by fairly quickly with splits of 3:52 and 4:06! Woot Woot! I was aiming for 4:20 splits so my confidence is now way up. The recovery after wasn't even that difficult with the next 2 kms at 4:51 and 4:45. Look at all that green on the heatmap:
I think I'm definitively getting my shape back this Spring. It was awesome to be running in shorts and short sleeve tshirt again. I am looking forward to my performance in Montreal and the rest of my running season this year!

If you are in Ottawa, consider joining us for the Ottawa FrontRunners speed workouts on Thursdays. We meet at 6:30pm at the Lisgar entrance of City Hall and head to either Parliament Hill or a local track to do some drills. We try to keep the drills varied every week and the bunch is always a fun group to be with.

Boston Getting Faster still

The blogosphere has been very actively discussing the new changes for the Boston Qualifying times and registration process. While the 5 minutes and 59 seconds cut in 2013 is the most obvious change, the one most likely to impact runners is the progressive opening of registrations for runners 20, 10 and 5 minutes under the official BQ times. For an in depth look at the likely consequences of this move, read Ray's very insightful analysis on his blog, the DC Rainmaker.

I share Marlene's concerns that this will make it more difficult to qualify and run Boston. I also, like Yumke, realize that just qualifying won't be enough. My new target to guarantee a Boston slot is 2:50 for 2012 and 2:45 beyond. I already gained lots of time last year, I think I can achieve this eventually. At last resort, I can just get older. The upside of this new goal is that 2:45 will be a golden ticket almost everywhere guaranteeing me entry into other coveted races such as New York and London marathons.

Ready, Set, Wait!

With about 60 hours left before I land in Miami and 4 days to race start, there's not much more I can do to make myself ready. I will soon start the nutrition and hydration routine that has seen me through numerous races in the past. This race is a little bit different. It compares a lot to my first ever half marathon where the goal was to finish strong, not necessarily with any time target in mind. Coming back from Bronchitis, I have lost a significant amount of speed and endurance and until yesterday, I wasn't sure if I had it in me to run 21km this Sunday. Knowing that long distance races are often much more of a mind-trick than a body workout, I set out to run 18km, to prove to myself that I can do it. Whether that was smart or not 5 days before the race, I am not certain. What I do know is that without having done this training run, the mind tricks and the race day goblins would have started to creep up on me at km 15 or a full 6km before the end, roughly a half hour. Now I have those goblins beat until probably km 19, where a mere 10 minutes will see me end the race. I think I may have won the mind battle ahead of time, take that Goblin! Long distance runners will know what I am talking about, non runners, trust me on this, it makes all the difference to be able to trust yourself and your training until almost the very end.

Yesterday's 18km was done at 5:30m/km pace, so if I do everything right, I should come in a bit under 2 hours. But I don't really care if it takes me 2 and half hours on Sunday. The course will be beautiful and warm and the cruise boat doesn't leave until 4pm. With a 6am race start, that's plenty of time to finish, enjoy the party, get cleaned up and then head for the boat. I for one will not be sad to leave the Ottawa cold behind. We've been having a patch of -20 to -30 Celsius with some rough winds making it feel even colder.

I'm not sure how much time I'll have to update the blog after the race. Follow my twitter feed if you want to know how I did. Oh, would you look at that, it's now 59 hours before touchdown ;)

BQ or Bust!

I am usually fairly conservative when setting race goals. I like to be able to achieve them and reflect on my success. This time however is a bit different. I've been fairly straight forward with my goal to qualify for Boston eventually. With all the hard work I've put in over the summer, this might happen this Sunday. I could probably set a reasonable goal of 3:20 and shatter it at 3:18. However, I think a BQ (3:10) is achievable if I have a good day so I'll be pushing as hard as I can for as long as I can and then hang on and see where that goes. I realize that I may be putting a PB in jeopardy if I completely blow up at km 30, however I want to get that BQ under my belt so I can take it somewhat easy with my training for Miami.

The long term forecast looks pretty good for Hamilton with chilly but sunny temperatures. There's a slight 20km/h wind, we'll just have to hope that it's not going directly against the course. I have my outfits picked out, my gels tucked away and my shoes ready to roar. All I have to do now is trust the training and convince myself that this is not a cold I feel coming on and that my feet are not suffering from plantar fasciitis from walking around my winter boots for 10 minutes. Tapering is hard. I didn't remember running so many kms during the last week of training but looking back at my training log for my past marathons, I am right on par with another 10k run tomorrow and then a 6km Saturday before the big dance on Sunday. I may not post until after the race so follow me on Twitter in the meantime.

H&M

H&M is a famous clothing store, but the H&M I am referring to isn't a big chain. You may remember a few months back, I was trying to decide what marathon to run next and I was undecided with two of my choices. You know that I will be attempting to BQ at Hamilton's Road2Hope marathon but what I haven't shared with you yet is that I wasn't able to resist a very tempting offer from runnfun.ca and decided to go ahead and book their Miami Marathon and Cruise package. H&M is then my new challenge: Hamilton & Miami.
The goal is still a BQ at Hamilton and then a scenic fun marathon at Miami but if for some reason I am unable to obtain my BQ at Hamilton, then the race is on for Miami :) I will spend 7 days after the race being pampered on the Carnival Glory visiting exotic beaches and hopefully take in a bit of snorkeling.
Training this week has been pretty good so far. I'm trying to cram it all in early in the week so I can get a head start on next week's mileage since the week after I will be busy travelling for a conference. I went really back to back with a tempo 18k (+3k warmup/cooldown) yesterday evening at an average 4:34m/km. No wonder this morning's 16k intervals wasn't quite as satisfying with fast intervals at 4:24m/km.

Super week

Last week was actually a pretty good week for training for me. I am resetting my training for my next marathon (destination undecided at this point, Hamilton and Miami are both leading contenders). That means that the distances that were tempo runs during my last cycle will now be "long slow distance" runs. I ran to work again last week at a respectable pace of 5:26m/km. It's difficult to slow down but I know in the long run it will pay off :)

I had two off days where I procrastinated and found reasons not to train but then I bounced back with an amazing tempo run (10k at 46m27s) on Friday and then a good interval run on Saturday where I finally reached my 4:20m/km goal for average tempo portions. I could probably have had all the intervals under 4:20 if it wasn't for that hill!

• 4:09, 4:11, 4:19, 4:29, 4:14 (average: 4:17m/km!)

Sunday was a bit of a downer, I attempted a long slow run again but had to cut it short when my left calf started to complain. I can see how 2 back to back speed sessions would do that :)

I'm still not exactly where I'd like to be to start my next marathon training but depending on the date I may already be in the cycle :) I'll have to really put in the effort to bump up my speed if this one will be the one where I try to qualify for Boston (the time I need is 3:10, a pace of ~4:30m/km or 7:18m/mile if my math is right)

LA Afterthoughts + C4C

I received lots of online and offline congrats and comments about LA! Thank you! One of the things that came back the most was about taking so many pictures yet crushing my goal at the same time.... How did I manage it?

First of all, I don't think my goal was too easy. I think I just had a very rare perfect day. The fact that I was in a timezone 3 hours behind made the 7am start quite a late one for my eastern system and my nutrition was going right on schedule prior to the race, thanks to an All-you-can-eat pasta special for the Marathon at Maria's downtown LA. The weather was gorgeous. Even if it got a bit hot in downtown, once when we started going towards the sea the refreshing breeze came in to cool us down. The course was fabulous with lots of sights to take your mind off the grueling task of putting one foot before another and the community support was outstanding, recharging my batteries at every turn. I can't forget mentionning that my dad was also inspiring me to push the limit of what I knew I could do.

As the picture taking, I think it actually helped make me faster. Marathoners will know that the course can get pretty lonely and boring. It's not unusual to strike up a conversation with fellow runners when breathing is allowing it. Taking our minds off the littles aches that are developing or not thinking about how much fuel is left in the tank versus how many miles are left on the course is paramount to a good performance. Having the camera and thinking about the pictures and the sights that I wanted to bring back to friends and family did just that for me. While the running backwards was a bit dangerous (I almost tripped at least twice!) it also gave my muscles a break in the motion and I think this had a positive effect.

Where do I go from here? I have another marathon scheduled for the end of May, in my hometown with friends and family watching. I'll have to do well! My goal is simply a repeat of my LA performance to confirm that I am strong and can use the summer to get even faster towards that elusive Boston Qualifying time (3:10 for me).

LA Marathon, like most major races, had a bunch of race photographers on site. I never understood the race photography economy. While I do realize they spend tremendous amounts of money to take all these beautiful pictures such as this one:
What I never understood is the market for these pictures. A single picture will cost you $60. Granted they also offer an "economical' download of all the pictures they take of you for a "modest" $80. I can't justify myself paying that much money for pictures. Yes, I want a copy. These are amazing pictures of what is for the most part an extraordinary event, but seriously, $60 per picture? I had a chat with the girl at the counter at the expo about this. She seemed to hold a position of fair responsibility in the company and all she could do to validate that $80 for a download of all the pictures was a fair price was that it was their most popular product. I don't have an MBA in race photography economics, but let's say there are 50 photographers paid a per diem of $2,000 (I think this is generous, especially for LA where every closet paparazzi has good quality photo equipment), that's only $100,000 of fixed cost per event. Add in a generous amortization of $50,000 per race for website and bib recognition software and you only have a fixed cost of $150,000. If you sell a download package to %10 of the field at $80, that's $200k ($50k of profits). If you'd sell the same package for $25, you'd probably get %50 or more of the field buying it, that's over $300k ($150k profit). Maybe I'm wrong and there's already %50 of the field buying the download and I'm totally off the track here with my numbers.

If you are in the race photography business, I think your sweet spot for an almost universal buyin is about %25 of the cost of the race entry fee. For $25 or less, I'd buy the pictures before the race, before I even see them and not ask for a refund if they are no good. Anything over $30, I'll wait to see the results and if they are good I will get them. Anything over $40 I won't even think about it even if the picture is worthy of Time Magazine or National Geographics.

One of the benefits of having gone to LA is that I broke my phone so I got this new one:
It's more like a computer than a phone really and it has a GPS. I've seen lots of software for running and tracking distance, pace, etc and I will be trying them out in the next few weeks to see if there is a possibility of replacing my garmin. Less electronics to carry while I run is better in my books but I think it will be difficult to replace the purpose built Garmin watch with a more general use device like a phone. More on this as I experiment with the various software. If you have any suggestions for a good running software that runs on Android, let me know!

I totally forgot the C4C with the race excitement so I'll use the comments on my race report for the March numbers, so 8 food items will be donated to the Kanata Food Cupboard. Don't think that's enough to feed the needy? Leave your comments here for April's C4C, for every visitor that leaves a comment I'll donate one non-perishable item. If we go over 8 comments, I'll double March's donation!

En Route to LA

By the time you read this, I will most likely be en route to Los Angeles to run the marathon. The last few weeks have been quiet on the blog as I've been extremely busy and dealing with the recent loss of my father. The Los Angeles trip will be an opportunity for me to recharge my batteries and honour my dad by dedicating this race and the expected PR to him.

Even if my training has been uneven in the last few weeks, I think I have a solid base to work with and perform quite well at the race. I think that I have a sub 4 hour marathon in me, whether it comes out in LA is still unclear. This will be a fantastic and scenic course so if I need to slow down to admire the scenery, I will. On the other hand, if I see a celebrity, I'll spare no effort to leave them behind in my dust :) Do you hear that Shia and Gordon? The race is on!

If you're in LA and want to meet up, leave a comment or @ msg / DM me on twitter. Also follow my twitter feed on Sunday for results right after the race if I am lucid enough to tweet about my experience :)

Marathon Marketing

If you ran in the Ottawa Race Weekend last year, chances are you received one of the personalised postcards last week.
I thought the these were really cool marketing tools with my finishing time at the front and a spot to mark my goal for this year at the back
This campaign is definitively effective in my case since I signed up for the marathon! it's a bit soon for specific goals but I'll be gunning for a PR for sure.

Time has been rare these days to update the blog and comment on yours. I did make time for a 32km (20m) run on Sunday that was a bit tough in the 15-20km/h winds. I did finish it in 3h02m so that's not too too bad but my legs were definitively feeling it! I'm guessing that the -19 with windchill did not take into account where I was running into the winds at 10-12 km/h ;)

In the mix this week is Les 3 accords, AC/DC, Delirium and Orichalcum & the Deviant.

Commitment Run

I always have a problem with commitment for races. I've had issues in the past where I couldn't devote the time required to training and ended up running races I wasn't prepared for. RoadBunner's comment on my last entry made me think about my goals for this year. My boyfriend and family know I will run LA Marathon. My boss and colleagues know that I will run LA Marathon. Even you guys know I will run LA Marathon. But until this morning, I didn't really know if I would run LA Marathon.

My training plan called for an easy paced 32km run today. I'm not sure why they call easy but it certainly was far from easy. My first challenge was getting out of bed. Despite the beautiful sun shining outside, I didn't feel like getting up. I finally pulled myself out of bed, had a quick breakfast and procrastinated a bit, trying to find reasons not to run. I finally got dressed and headed out the door after a sleepy Alex asked me why I didn't get up earlier for my 3 hour run instead of delaying all the days' other activities :)

Once I was out, I really enjoyed the beautiful sun:
I didn't know where I was going. A good 32km course is hard to find around here in winter. I knew of a good ~6km loop so I decided to do it 5 times. I must be a bit of a masochist to think up of such a plan. The upside that my oxygen deprived self identified quickly was that I could opt out of the long run every time I ran by close to home.
The first loop was difficult even if the weather was gorgeous! On more than one occasion I tried to find a reason to stop after the first loop and motivation became an issue. I knew that my usual food rewards would not be enough to keep me going so I decided put my participation in the LA Marathon in play. If I finished this 32km training run today, I would finally sign up! Thankfully I also had some pretty pumping music to keep me going and even if I'm a bit ashamed to say, Aqua's Candyman actually saved me and gave me the motivation to keep plugging at it. Say what you want about Aqua being over-the-top cheesy but this morning, their music was to my ears what a handful is Skittles is to my taste buds :)

Speedwise I did really well in keeping an overall pace that is pretty reasonable.
My average speed for the entire run is about 5m23s/km or 11.1 km/h. My slowest km was 5m39s and my fastest 4m59s. Pretty even if you ask me.

The course itself was really boring. I saw 1 other runner and some people walking their dogs. Most of it was deserted.
Still, I managed to go around this loop 5 times, proving that I really really want to go to Los Angeles :) And if finishing this run wasn't an achievement worthy enough already, I finished on track for a sub 4 hour finish. YeeHaw! I'm not sure I could have kept going at that speed for another 10 km but I'll figure that part out in LA :)

In the mix today was a totally random assortment of music. Aqua's Greatest Hits, Mes Aieux's En Famille, Total Eclipse's Delta Aquarids, Space Tribe's ShapeShifter and Xerox and Freeman's Human Race.

Year in Review - Late C4C

With the weather outside turning all wet and icy, I have had to take my training inside. (That is an actual picture of the light at my front porch!)
I'm still not quite sure if my training session today will be in the gym or if I will brave the thin layer of snow on what is probably icy sidewalks underneath.

With this new dose of winter, I started thinking about my training so far this year and how much it has changed. A year ago, after conquering the marathon distance (at a snail's pace admittedly), I turned my sights to a new challenge: the Triathlon. I found a nice indoor trainer for the bike portion, familiarized myself with the myriads of pools around my stomping grounds and their various schedules and conquered old man winter to run in the cold, running outside throughout the winter was a first for me.

My training regimen was pretty hardcore by my standards. Most days saw at least training in one of the disciplines and sometimes even two. Rest days were few and far between with usually one or sometimes two a week. I also started blogging to share my experience with current friends and family. Little did I know that the blogging would introduce me to an entire community of athletes and allow me to create new friendships. All my training really paid off when I completed my first triathlon and met my objective.

Life sometimes take unexpected turns and that's what happenned after the triathlon where I left for China. I had wonderful experiences in China but was unable to keep the training up because of various health concerns. I still had some incredible runs and life experiences in China so I'm not even concerned about the setback that the trip introduced training-wise.

While I don't keep an official mileage counter, having a nifty GPS device that I carry with me whenever I run has advantages. I was able to play with the numbers and get my total so far for 2009 so far: 570km of running and 2380km of biking! Incredible. If I ran all these runs in the same direction, I would have been able to run to Niagara Falls! Add the biking and I would have reached Miami! Incredible!

All the training for the triathlon was fun, but with my current schedule, it's very hard to keep up with all the training. Plus the gear required for a triathlon is really intense. If I'm really serious about competing, I'd need at least a new bike and some way to carry it around like a car rack or something. I'm not saying I'll never do a triathlon again, but at this point in my life, I need simplicity and training for a triathlon is not simple!!!

Coming back from the experience of having trained and participated in a triathlon, I now have a new goal. This new goal is a bit of an old friend of mine. While I may have conquered the marathon distance at ScotiaBank Waterfront Marathon in 2008, but I never quite conquered the clock to my satisfaction. Entering this new year and decade, I have two goals with regards to the marathon clock. This year, I would like to break the 4 hour marathon. This decade, I want to qualify and run Boston. Quite the goal, eh? I figure that if I can't get to 3:10 in the next 5 years, at least it will get easier when it drops to 3:15 on the accounts of me getting older at that time :) Now that I've committed to it in digital ink, I will have to deliver. I hope I can take you all on that exciting journey with me.

I didn't post on Friday so this will have to take place of the Cans for Comments for last week. The total from the week before was 8 cans so here is what is going to the food bank:
Since I'm late with the C4C post and this is prime holiday season, I will pledge to donate at least 14 cans which is the total from my most popular C4C post. If we can break that number, I will top it up of course!

Tempo Lunch + Thank You!

After yesterday's failure to get out to run in the dark early morning, I was able to make a bit of time and go out for an early lunch run. Being a bit short on time, I made it a tempo run, thinking I could shave a few minutes that way.

Going back to a familiar route after a long absence from it is somewhat like seeing an old friend that moved out of town. While there has been a few changes over time, making things more interesting as you need to catch up, the basic features are the same and I was reminded why I liked this course so much that I ran it at least twice a week over 2 years ago.
I can't say that the whole run was easy, but it definitively felt better than my other runs since I started training again. I feel like I'm getting back in the thick of things and even if I didn't meet my goal of finishing under 50 minutes (I did 50:41 according to the watch) I am pretty satisfied with my speed with the following lap times:

• 4:44
• 5:02
• 5:14
• 5:06
• 5:09
• 5:11
• 5:13
• 4:42
• 4:53
• 4:56

Maybe Atomic's Serial Killaz helped me maintain a more steady pace throughout the 10km
Another week or two of catch up training and I will be ready to start a marathon training plan, hopefully in time to catch up with the Los Angeles Marathon. Anybody knows a good 12 week plan? I have a 16 week plan that I can probably compress a bit :)

And a big Thank You! to all that commented yesterday! I also received offline comments so I'll be adding cans for those as well.

I'm back!

It felt good today to be able to run and breathe deeply without worrying about air pollution :) After spending 5 weeks in China where I tried to train as much as possible, it just wasn't the same as training at home. I would constantly stop during my runs to admire the sights and take some pictures and on the polluted days I had to slow down or stop early because I developped breathing problems. For the last 2 weeks, I don't even think I trained at all.

Getting back on the training routine after breaking for so long was also a bit hard. I couldn't find the motivation, let alone the time. But today, on this otherwise uneventful Monday, I decided to put on my new Chinese running outfit and go for it.

I was a bit anxious to see what my level of fitness was and while it felt good to run, I was much slower than I used to be. Three months ago, a 50 minute 10km would have been easy. Today I struggled and got a time of 53 minutes, even though I have to admit that I threw in a difficult stair workout at the end so I can probably cut 2 minutes and still be honest about my performance.
While I was running, I realised that I don't have a short term goal beside working my way up to the first week of my marathon training schedule so I decided to try to fit in the running room's resolution run if I can manage it in my holiday schedule. Three months ago, my goal would have been to break 45 minutes. I'm not quite sure I can get back up to speed that quickly but I'm willing to put in the effort and see what happens.

In the mix today was the always kicking even if it's 10 years old compilation Digitale.

What's next?

What's next? Being without a goal when I train is refreshingly weird. I took my bike to work on 3 days this week (nothing exciting, about 1 hour each time) and it was quite refreshing to be riding just for fun. Leisurely riding along reconnected me with why I love it so much. Not having to worry about times and effort lifted a big weight off my shoulders and let me concentrate on enjoying the moment for what it is, instead of pushing harder and harder.

That being said, I need a new goal. I don't remember the last time I was training with no goal in mind. I know that my next race is a running race. I know I will run in the Ottawa race weekend next year but I have to wait until the sponsor is announced before I decide which distance since I pledged to run the full marathon if Rogers decides to be the title sponsor!! And I want something a bit sooner... Does anyone know of any fun events in Ontario/Quebec between late November and March?
One option is the Winterman. That event has always puzzled me, a full marathon in the middle of winter. Should be fun. Then I found out that the marathon course is an out and back course. I hate out and back courses. Not only that but it is only 5km, which you repeat 8 times for the full marathon. I don't think I have the mental stamina to run the same 2.5km stretch 16 times.

Another fun option would be a race somewhere warm. Something like the Arizona Rock and Roll Marathon could be fun. I even found a Caribbean cruise with a running twist where you can share the experience with famous runners like Bart Yasso.

I don't know why I'm focusing on marathon courses since I haven't decided for sure that I want another crack at the distance. I'm pretty sure most of these races feature shorter distances such as the HM or 10k.

What I know for sure is that I will be going to the Terry Fox Run in Kanata this Sunday and that I gave my name to volunteer for the Army Run on the 20th but I am still awaiting confirmation.

It's funny that I wrote most of this post this morning but had to leave it in draft when I ran out of time. Then just before I got off work, I received an email from a colleague about a 5k race for Charity on October 1st. I guess that is my new goal. The race is a friendly just for fun (and charity!) contest between a few government departments. I hope I can make my department proud!

Rain Day - Target Setting

Today's rainy so I'm using the weather as an excuse to let my lazy side win the day. As I rest and get my body ready to go back at it tomorrow, it's time to take a step back and plan for how high I want to reach.

As you may already have seen on the left, my next race is the Ottawa Half Marathon (21.1km). As I approach this race, I feel excited with the possibility of reaching further than ever before. I've raced the Ottawa Half Marathon a few times in the past:

• 2008 - 1h50
• 2007 - 1h43
• 2006 - 2h08

Last year, I was recovering from a bad case of plantar fasciitis so my objective was merely to finish without injuring myself. And my next race after that was a marathon, so my training focused on building my endurance instead of speed. I had to manage all this training while also tackling a new challenge: cycling to work for a total of 250km a week. That summer I biked on average four days a week and ran once (only on the way back, I would bus into work!).

This year should be fun as I add swimming to the mix and try to get my speed up. My challenge is a new PB at the half marathon with a hope of finishing under 1:40 (yeah, right!). I know I will regret having announced this already but I think it sets a target at which to throw everything I've got.