This week was a pretty standard week in terms of everything, as usual I completed all my trainings and had my first interval session of this transition phase which felt good and I’m excited to continue to ramp them up and build some speed and paced endurance leading into my half marathon in just over a months time.
It was my final week of the term at school and now heading into two weeks of holidays before finishing my schooling off with a final two and a half week stretch, finishing school has come much quicker than I expected but I’m excited for the future and what I can achieve. This past Wednesday I held my fourth and final annual Shave For A Cure event at my school starting it just when I was year 10 (14 years old) and now year 13 and 17 years old. This was my biggest year of participants and it was so overwhelmingly exciting to see such an event I have put so much effort into building continue to strive, I hope that in the future years younger students continue this event, this year we raised a total of around $4,000 towards the blood cancer and cancer research website known as “Shave For A Cure”.
All up over my four years I would have accumulated a donation organised of over $11,000 and I am proud that I can say that and am sure it would have helped a large number of people in need.
This week I also ran a new direction of long run, instead of my usual out and back, or double out and back, or randomly around I drove myself to Paeroa about 20-minutes away parked my car and ran home, this was almost the perfect distance and by that I mean I had to turn around for 5 minutes to add 10 minutes onto the run to make it long enough, sometimes I enjoy running one way as the whole scenic route is new the whole way, rather than working to half way and then repeating it backwards. There’s something sometimes about having to turn around that leading up to half way can feel like a drag as you are running opposite to the finish line, the weather was perfect blue skies, no one on the trail (as it was too early) and the temperature was warm but not overheating, peak long run conditions I would say. I’m enjoying this training block as I’ve really been able to settle in my trainings and just enjoy them for what they are and be present in myself.
– Jessica Bray