blister in the sun

when i sort of sauntered into the shower today after arriving home from running in the largest race in the world: sydney's sun-herald city2surf, i screamed for five minutes solid. water was as acid to my feet.

apologies for the grotesque, but i ran on a matching set of massive foot blisters for at least 12 of the 14kms. "fun run" was a concept stretch for awhile there, especially whilst darting amongst the minefield of wheeled baby-strollers & novelty dress-up animals from the very rear of the back pack. as i inexpertly zigged & zagged searching & failing to find my lost friend whilst negotiating a stomach-dragging gradient that went up forever, heartbreak hill may have slowed many to a paltry stagger but it literally stole my sole.

as i ran through the william street tunnel enroute to the infamous city to surf milestone which is the aforementioned hill, it was sad to see someone actually did succumb & had dropped with a heart attack only minutes into the race. medics & police formed a protective barrier around him as my yellow bib-clad packmates soberly power-walked past.

it wasn't enough to spoil what was a beautiful & epic sydney sunday morning. without training after only registering a couple of weeks prior in some unthought through manic makeover mode, i managed to not only survive & finish amongst 75 000 others, but did the whole thing without slowing to a walk. preparation food groups were mostly um, lots of alcohol.

i probably wouldn't recommend this to others. however after experiencing what we writers/alcoholics refer to as a moment of clarity [a 90 minute long one whilst running to bondi] approach exercise with renewed vigour & now will prepare for the pending sunday telegraph 9kms bridge run.

as a member of the corporate sunday tele team i might actually do a few runs prior to minimise visible thigh wobble [i heard it clashes with the uniform]. whether the diet is modified in sync with a bunch of other journos however remains to be seen.

some amazing shots of the day here courtesy of gary hayes' funky flickr blog.