The Hidden Half - Bouncing back

I have to admit I was a bit disappointed when I found out that my C2S time was 84:05. I just felt that I was capable of better, and next year I will do it.

The week's training went well afterwards. I ran every day until Thursday, with an easy 5K recovery on Monday.

I did a quickish 9K on Tuesday that felt pretty good - a nice flat run along the Parramatta River. On Tuesday the New Garmin arrived. It thought that the date was April 1 2026 and it won't talk to the Garmin Training Centre. I fired off an email and I'm really hoping this time that they will let me upgrade to a 305.

Anyway, enough of the shoddy folk at GME. On Wednesday I took it pretty easy on a 7K runthrough the mangroves.

With the Garmin not able to be programmed I decided to just do a tempo session for speedwork on Thursday, so I started with an easy 3K, and follwed that with a hard 3K @ 5:19 pace. A nice easy 1.5K warm down and I felt pretty good.

I took a rest day on Friday. On Saturday Bop was feeling sick, so I did an easy 4 on my own before netball, and went into the Hidden HYalf feeling pretty good. DJ and the girls came along as support, which was great.

The Hidden Half has a nasty little hilly section of a couple of K that you have to run through twice. Given that I was off a dodgy C2S, and my key race from July yielded a flat 1:59, the thought was that I would be ecstatic with Sub 2.

It was never in doubt.

Given my form at the moment, I'd have to call it a blinder. I chatted with Striders and Coolrunners througfhout the early part of the race, and then I hit the hills. They hurt my lungs and legs, but I got through them the first time, and ran through 10K in about 54:00.

I knew I'd put some time in the bank, and I still felt pretty good, and so I just ran conservatively until I hit the hills again and took the a bit easier this time, but still at a fair pace.

When that section was over we had about 4K to go, and about 23 minutes left. I knew the rest was flat, so I just aimed at 5:40 pace knowing that I was right on. With about 2K to go I passed a guy who was walking, and said to him "Come on, two hours beckons!"

He laughed and said "you're right!", and we ran it in together. Truth be told he probably pushed me a bit faster. About 200 from home DJ and the girls were clapping me on, and then the already finished Coolrunner Rock Doctor joined us for 100m. We came in on 1:59:12. Absolutely stoked.

The Hidden Half is a top event. About 100 runners, organised by runners, well marshalled (although I did meet one guy who got lost today), cheap and one of the best free T-Shirts going. For those who can make it out to Bankstown on the Sunday morning after the C2S, I'd highly recommend it.