RobLog: May 2008

Saturday, May 10, 2008

New Zealand Music Month

In honour of NZ Music month, I thought I'd link some of my favorite Kiwi Music.

In no particular order or organisation:

Evermore: Running

Minuit: Fuji

Atlas: Crawl

Scribe: F.R.E.S.H.

Scribe: Say it Again

Solaa: Sylphlike

Tiki Taane: Tangaroa (God of the Sea)

Have a look at Amplifier.co.nz as well.

I completed the Rotorua Marathon last weekend (May 3rd).

I ran 4:07:03, which is my fastest New Zealand marathon, and way better than Rotorua last year. However it's a ways off my best marathon time (3:48), and probably not quite fast enough to keep me ahead of Craig when he runs the Marine Corp marathon in October. Fortunately, the Auckland Marathon is just a few days later (2 Nov), so I've got something definite to shoot for if Craig does beat me. ;-)

Anyway, conditions were just about perfect for Rotorua this year. Sunny, slightly cold, dry, and partly cloudy. It was an all around fantastic day for running. The only possible compliant is a little bit of a headwind along the open stretches around kilometers 25 to 35 or so.

My splits are surprisingly even. I can't come up with any issues with this race: Weather was perfect, the course is fast, and my nutrition/hydration felt great this time. I just need to do some training and run faster next time. I think that 8:01 for K35 is a misplaced marker. I did take a food break around there, but not that long, the 5:30 before that makes it doubly suspicious. I think that 5:30 probably ought to be about 6:30, with one minute off the 8:00 and about 30-40 seconds of the remaining 7:00 going to slacking off at the water stop. That would make the last kilometer my slowest at 7:06 (pretty much to be expected), and my fastest that 4:57 on the big downhill on the back side of the lake (also no surprise).


Km  Elapsed  Split
1      6:06   6:06
2     11:56   5:50
3     17:17   5:20
4     22:54   5:36
5     28:15   5:21
6     33:35   5:19
7     38:38   5:02
8     44:11   5:33
9     49:31   5:19
10    55:04   5:32
11  1:00:36   5:32
12  1:05:56   5:19
13  1:11:09   5:13
14  1:16:35   5:25
15  1:21:57   5:22
16  1:27:54   5:57
17  1:33:59   6:04
18  1:38:56   4:57
19  1:44:30   5:33
20  1:50:20   5:50
21  1:56:33   6:13
22  2:02:05   5:31
23  2:07:27   5:21
24  2:13:27   6:00
25  2:19:29   6:01
26  2:25:04   5:34
27  2:31:01   5:57
28  2:36:28   5:26
29  2:42:19   5:50
30  2:48:06   5:47
31  2:54:06   5:59
32  3:00:30   6:24
33  3:07:27   6:56
34  3:13:01   5:33
35  3:21:02   8:01
36  3:27:28   6:25
37  3:33:55   6:26
38  3:40:24   6:28
39  3:47:06   6:42
40  3:53:36   6:29
41  3:59:58   6:22
42  4:07:03   7:06

Sunday, May 04, 2008

Photo Catchup Part II

Still more catching up to do . .

As a Christmas present, I enrolled Kel in a Darjit Garden Sculpture workshop over in Tauranga. She created a planter for her mum's garden.

I took some photos, then headed off to climb Mt. Maunganui, and do some surf kayaking at the beach.

She liked that class so much, she enrolled for another one before leaving at the end of the second day. In that one she's been making a big garden throne. That's still in progress, she's going to cover it with mosaic.

A couple of weekends ago I drove down to Tauranga to pick it up (it takes a week to dry, and Kel was on call that next weekend). On the way back, I stopped in Hamilton to catch the Nightglow part of the Balloons Over Waikato festivities.

Over the last few weeks, we've been photographing all of Kel's paintings and Sculptures, and posting them to a web site we've set up. http://www.kelhicreative.co.nz/. I'll post more of the Darjit Garden Sculpture photos there as they progress.

Photo Catchup

Alright, It's been way too long since I've posted to do much in the way of catchup. I'll have to settle for a barrage of photos. Here goes:

Trip to Minnesota, late December early January

Highlights:

Seeing family again

Kel's first white Xmas

Staying up North at Grand View Lodge with the gang

Dogsledding

Cross Country Skiing with Craig and Jeff

Catching up with friends in town

Seeing all the Xmas Lights

Catching a Wild game in St. Paul

Kel, Claire and Joel from Suomi Hills Kennels

Second Christmas in Whakatane

After getting back to New Zealand, we had a second holiday celebration down in Whakatane, Kel's hometown in the Bay of Plenty. For those of you who've met Kel's mother's dog Cindy, we saw her for the first time after her summer haircut, it was hilarious! Definitely much nicer to have the shorter coat for swimming over at Ohope.

Miscellaneous News from back in NZ

In mid January, I did the Wild Turkey Off-Road Half Marathon. That was a blast, after about 7 km along the beach, it had a whole long canyoneering section in the middle. I spent more time taking photos than running, but it was all great fun. My friend Staton spent most of the race trying to keep his iPod dry. :-)