websiteilliteratedon'tknowwhatthisbitis
Running Through China
  • About Me
  • Blog
  • Race Pictures
  • Nutrition For Runners
  • Contact Me

Chill af

1/22/2017

0 Comments

 
I have been to a lot of relaxing, stunning places in my life, but this particular place is particularly ‘chill’. It’s perfect: there’s a 10km stretch of coastline nearby (think one continuous, beautiful, mostly-untouched beach, with a line of shady, sheltering trees between the road and the sand) to run alongside/up and down, a hill/mountain inland (for views and for dreaming of future trail running), friendly and lovely people, a plethora of delicious and cheap food/snacks, clean air, blue skies, plus mostly friendly local dogs. Oh and red squirrels in the morning too. That’s a nice touch. The perfect place to come and hang in post-Hanoi and pre-Bangkok marathon. Which is now just under two weeks away! Eek...

I’m feeling that familiar pre-race nervousness now, but for an entirely different reason to usual. There are no nerves for wanting to beat a previous time or set a new pb. No, I’m going to take this one quite cruisily and won’t be aiming to beat my previous time of 3:26. (Mind you, anywhere ideally somewhere before the 4 hour mark would be good, but who knows...). I am feeling a bit nervous due to the time of the race: namely, this race begins at midnight! So will effectively be a night-race as the whole thing will be in the dark. Hmmm...
I have zero to little training at night (and won’t be doing any here, in case this rattles the local soi dogs or confuses them into attacking or something) and previous attempts at running in the dark have included two rolled ankles. Hopefully this won’t be the case again! But I will be taking it very carefully and gently anyway. Just in case. It will be strange having the race essentially at the end of the day too, and there won’t be any sleep the night before. Maybe I will sneak an arvo ‘power’ nap in on 4th, who knows.... But, as an ultra-marathoner mentioned, maybe it’s a good thing: then I can just have a feed and go to sleep straight afterwards. Which sounds like a plan.
Well, sleep for a little bit anyway, but not for too long as then I will be straight off to the airport to catch my flight back home to Straya!! I. Can’t. Wait.
Before then: two weeks of tapering in quiet and peaceful Thailand (where, yes, amazing massages also feature as part of my ‘training’, obviously) can be no bad thing.

Sending love to you all and missing you. You know who you are. xxxxx


Here are a few pics of my current training area:

Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
0 Comments

Q: How Would You Coax a Bear Out of a Cave in Japan??....

1/15/2017

0 Comments

 
.......Tempura CAMEMBERT!

I have to backtrack. The last two weeks have been crazy (I believe 'crae-crae' is the word on the street) and I haven't done justice to the amazing food that was had in Japan during my brief holiday there with the one and only Amazing Kim. So this post is dedicated to all things foodie that I loved in Tokyo, and yes I know this is predominantly a RUNNING blog, but hey: food and fuel is a BIG part of running and makes ALL the difference, believe me (or work with me and try it for yourself!
www.lousweight.com.au). However if you are here because you're curious about my marathon training: never fear: all is on track: completed my final long run yesterday (through beautiful, peaceful, coastal Thailand, ahhhh....) and I am pumped for 5th February and now am tapering-ish.

So, one of the BEST things we ate over there was without a doubt the tempura camembert. Yes, you read that correctly: tempura camembert. It was ah-maze-ing:

Picture
Sweet ginger tempura was also pretty fantastic, as was tempura asparagus, and tempura anything really. From that, to delicious marinated tofu, tasty sushi, seaweed salads, stuffed sweet pancakes, green tea, random/almost unidentifiable snacks/mini-meals from good ole Family Mart, red bean mochi, and of course the ubiquitous daily (ok, more than once daily) matcha latte, we were in food and hot drink heaven.
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
I was also LOVING the fact that the teas/coffees (that you buy hot from the shop or vending machine) were not automatically pre-sugared either! Fantastic. I could easily live in Japan for a bit methinks...

For now, it's on with the next chapter: am temporarily in beautiful, peaceful, quiet Thailand as a bit of a break in between the chaos of commuting around Hanoi and pre-Bangkok marathon, while en route back to that lucky lucky country of Australia, of which I am so lucky and happy to be able to call home (it's true hey: no matter where I go, who I meet, or what I eat and do, I will always miss Newy).

Much love to you all. I am greatly missing you all in Hanoi already (you know who you are) but we will meet again elsewhere in this wonderful world, I'm sure of it. xxx

0 Comments

No-Yes, Yes-No, YENSO Park! LDR Half Marathon

1/8/2017

0 Comments

 
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Picture
Something upsetting or troubling you? Go for a run. That's my advice, and it really works. Something had been upsetting me all week (you know where your mind just keeps going over and over the same one negative train of thought?) and I told myself at the beginning of this race, that if I did well or had a good result then I simply wouldn't be upset anymore. For the duration of the LDR Half Marathon (1:41 - 6 minutes slower than my last half) held yesterday morning in beautiful Yenso Park here in Hanoi, I managed to not dwell on the negative thought that had been plaguing me all week, and instead, had a really pleasant, lovely run, with an awesome bunch of runners.

Oh, and I got a good result too (the power of positive thinking): I won! This was a surprise and was not my initial intention: I had wanted to take it pretty cruisily so that I could then run home from the race venue and make the whole thing my 'long' long run of the week. However, about a km and a half in, my legs sped up as if of their own accord and they felt pretty fresh and 'good' (despite a return to circuit and strength training just a day ago), so I went with it and managed to keep a better pace up and won first place! This was very exciting, and it was lovely to see everyone there. There is such a great running community here in Hanoi and I will truly miss it and everyone when I leave.

I did eventually get the remaining 15km in to make up the rest of my 'long' run for the week, in case you were wondering, but chose to do it around the beautiful West Lake (as per usual, lol) instead of back up the crazy busy main road that led out of town to Yenso Park (thanks again to a champion friend for driving me all the way home afterwards). Job done, but feeling a bit fatigued today. Going to opt for lots of the usual healing foods (green veggies, mushrooms, salmon, turmeric etc) and a short recovery run later on. The Bangkok Marathon is really not far away now! Will soon be taper time, so am looking forward to that.

Have a wonderful week everyone, lots of love from here in Hanoi!!

0 Comments

    Author

    A 30-something's running and travelling experience around the world.

    Archives

    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    May 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013

    Categories

    All
    27th
    50km
    Abs
    Acting
    Active Recovery
    Afghan Hound
    Albert Einstein
    Amazeballs
    Angry
    Anhui
    Annie
    Anniversary
    ARD
    Australia
    Auto-pilot
    Autumn
    Awesome
    Bacon
    Badass
    Bali
    Barefoot Running
    Beautiful
    Beijing
    Ben Elton
    Besties
    Biryani
    Bliss
    Blog
    Blogger
    Blue Sky
    Boobs
    Books
    Bread
    Brighton
    Busy
    Calves
    Camelback
    Caravan
    Carbo Loading
    Carboloadingf2e058d5a9
    Cardio
    Caring
    Carpet
    China
    Chinese
    Chinglish
    Chocolate Milk
    Christmas
    Cleaning
    Close
    Coach
    Coffee
    Coincidence
    Cold
    Cooking
    Core
    Covert Mission
    Cross Training
    Cycling
    Dad
    Date
    Deepak Chopra
    Dehydrated
    Dough
    Driving
    Duck
    Excited
    Expectation
    Feeling Tired
    Flowers
    Flying
    Food Addiction
    Fresh Food
    Friday
    Fuel
    Full Moon
    Gangsta
    Garmin
    Genghis Khan
    GM
    Gods
    Gold-coast
    Goldilocks
    Goose
    Grass
    Grasslands
    Great Wall
    Green Tea
    Grief
    Grumpy
    Hair
    Halloween
    Hangover
    Hangry
    Hangzhou
    Hard
    Hasfit
    Hastings
    Hazara
    Health
    Healthy
    Henan
    Herbs
    Hohhot
    Holiday
    Hotel
    Huangshan
    Hui
    Hulunbeier
    Humid
    Hungry
    Hunter-valley
    Husband
    Ill
    Inner Mongolia
    Internet
    Jiangxi
    Jiuhuashan
    Kickboxing
    Knee Pain
    Lembongan Island
    Liebster-award
    Lijiashan
    Longmen Caves
    Long Run
    Lushan
    Mantra
    Marathon
    Mask
    Massage
    May-day
    Medical Exam
    Meh
    Memory
    Monday
    Mongolian
    Monsanto
    Mood
    Moon
    Morning
    Mother
    Motivation
    Motivational
    Mountains
    MTB
    Negative
    Nerves
    Newcastle
    New Job
    New-zealand
    Night
    Oatmeal
    Off The Beaten Track
    Oil
    Over Trainingffa29052b5
    Pain
    Past
    Pb
    Peanut Butter
    Photos
    Ping Pong
    Pingyao
    Playing
    Pollution
    Pool-running
    Porridge
    Positive
    Poyang-lake
    Procrastination
    Program
    Progress
    Pumped
    Pumpkin Pie
    Puppy
    Pussy
    Pyjamas
    Qingming
    Questions
    Quickie
    Rain
    Ready
    Recovery
    Red Belt
    Rest Day
    Riverside
    R-kelly
    Rob-schneider
    Rocky
    Runners-world
    Running Bracelet
    Running-group
    Running Movies
    Santos-bonacci
    Sav Blanc
    Scam
    Sex
    Shaanxi
    Shanghai
    Shanxi
    Shaolin Temple
    Shoes
    Sickness
    Singing
    Skittles
    Sleep
    Slow
    Smog
    Snickers
    Snow
    Solo
    Sore
    Speech
    Speed
    Speedwork
    Sports Bra
    Stationery
    Steps
    Stiff
    Strength
    Students
    Teaching English
    Temple
    Tempo
    Terracotta Warriors
    Text Message
    The Bund
    The Wall
    Threshold
    Time
    Tired
    Tofu
    Tongliao
    Track Workout
    Trailer
    Trail-race
    Training
    Triathlon
    Turkey
    Turmeric
    Twice
    Two
    Universe
    University
    Unsatisfied
    Vo2max
    Voice-over
    Water
    Weather
    Wedding
    Weekend
    West Lake
    White-horse-temple
    Whitney Houston
    Wine
    Worried
    WTF
    Xiamen Marathon
    Xian
    Xilinhot
    Yiwu
    Yoga
    Yungang Caves
    Zongzi

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.