Well, with this year's racing season looming, the time has come to make some plans.  After all, training for something like a half-marathon requires a bit of advanced preparation, and I'm nowhere near mentally or physically ready to run that distance yet.  Well, perhaps I should be a bit easier on myself, I have done some long runs up to 16km and with the adrenaline of race-day I could probably push out a painful 21.1km.  But, I don't want my first half-mary to be a hellish experience that will put me off racing for life.  I want to be secure and confident in knowing that I can cover the distance without collapsing from exhaustion or having my legs go on strike from over-use.  And so, knowing my time limitations, I now have to choose the half-marathon to run.

 

The two major contenders here are the Brisbane Half-Marathon on April 22nd, or the Gold Coast Half-Marathon on July 1st.  There are a few others run throughout the year, like the Doomben Half, but they're all smaller events and I much prefer running the bigger races.  The Gold Coast is definitely the biggest of all the events in Queensland, and I really enjoyed the atmosphere down there last time.  I also want to fit in a 10km race, the Bridge to Brisbane, and possibly another undetermined distance race depending on how my training is going.  Sounds like a simple decision, doesn't it?  Not quite!

 

There's a few things to consider here.  The difficulty of the course is a major selling-point.  In this case, the Gold Coast is a clear winner, with the half-marathon course there being well-known for being fast and flat.  Brisbane's course isn't hugely hilly, but its nowhere near as easy as G.C.  Another consideration is the date of the race.  Brisbane's calendar position of 22nd April is perhaps a little too close for comfort, and is also going to be on the warmer and more humid side than G.C.'s mid-winter spot.  So, that's two ticks to the Gold Coast so far.  Its looking like a simple decision at the moment.

 

But here comes the G.C. cons.  I ran the 10km race at the Gold-Coast last year, and I really want to run it again to get an accurate representation of my improvement by blowing last year's time out of the water.  That's going to be a little hard to do when the 10km race starts about an hour after the half-marathon!  So, if I were to do the half-mary at Brisbane in April, that would leave me free to do the G.C. 10km.  Plus in Brisbane I have the added advantage of being able to run the course beforehand.  The course is based around the river, and I regularly run those paths myself during training.  I'd be able to practice my pacing and get a good idea of when to push it and when to ease off.  Two ticks to Brisbane as well now!

 

So obviously the decision is not as simple as it first appeared.  I've had some time to ruminate on it, and I think that G.C.'s two ticks are a bit bigger than Brisbane's two ticks.  More time for training, a faster course and cooler temperatures should really outweigh my pride in beating last year's 10km PR.  And so, to get it all down in pixellated black and white before I can change my mind, here's my proposed racing plan this year -

 

The anticipation of that climb, excitement building as you're slowly edging up to the peak, the heart-stopping pause, then plummeting down at gut-wrenching speeds that leave you wondering where your stomach is.  Sounds great doesn't it?  Well, it would be if we weren't talking emotions here.  At first glance, the beginning of the week was bad enough, but in hindsight it was a kiddy-coaster compared to the last couple of days.  Alternating normal, rational thought with depressed moodiness has culminated in me over-reacting to a really good friend's good intentions, and subsequently messing things up.

 

With so many people in my life only deigning to contact me when they want something, I've been feeling very used, and paranoidly suspecting that people only see me as a walking brain with good listening ears.  So, feeling as emotionally irrational as I have been this week, I started seeing this behaviour in people that really didn't deserve it.  Namely, the aforementioned friend.  We'd been talking a bit more recently than we had in a while, I originally assumed we were just getting on well, which was great.  He's been looking for someone to work in his business, and had been hinting (not so subtly) that I could perhaps do with a change of career.  Now, my over-stressed mind starts thinking stupid things like "He must only be talking to me so much because he's trying to convince me to work for him."  Not only did I think that, while chatting on MSN I actually told him about thinking it.  Can we say "Oops!"  He promptly got offended, logged off MSN and didn't speak to me for the rest of the day. 

 

After a rather sleepless night of my mind ruminating on different variations of "What the hell was I thinking?" I apologised the next day, but things have been weird ever since.  It feels like I've alienated him again, like I used to do in the past when I got over-emotional.  I had been doing some casual weekend work for him, and when the time he would usually have organised me to work had passed, I chased him up on it.  Apparently he wouldn't have asked me for a while, he wanted to give me some space.  Rational side of my mind says "Ok, fair enough." However, my irrational side had a bit more to say about it, mostly along the lines of You've screwed things up now, haven't you?"  I'd been feeling pretty good today up until this point, where my stomach dropped through the floor and I started the downward plummet on the emotion rollercoaster.  Of course, judging by my reactions so far this week, I'm completely over-reacting again and I'll feel very differently when I wake up in the morning.

 

I think its my extreme reactiveness that's appalling me the most.  Things that wouldn't usually worry me are sending me into a tailspin.  One minute I'm my usual cheerful self, the next I'm ready to curl up in bed and have a cry at the slightest provocation.  This is kind of like the "old me", the depressive, insecure, attention-seeking nutcase that was continually driving people away with an insatiable need for reassurance and affection.  I'm not that person anymore, so I'm really quite aghast at how I've been feeling and acting this week.  I have been cutting down on my food a bit lately in an effort to drop the last of my "Christmas Kgs", perhaps that has something to do with it.  The timing is wrong for it to be PMS, and I'm generally not bothered much by the monthly monster in any case.  Either way, I need to get this sorted out ASAP.  I never liked rollercoasters anyway.