Last Sunday had a good hit out and positive outcome at the Swan Twilight 5km at Burswood. With some sponsorship and prize money, the event attracted a high standard field of WA’s best distance runners so I decided to ease back into racing a little earlier than originally planned and see where things where at.

The most impressive effort of the night was our EEP athlete, Brandon Hargreaves who ran a course record 15.07 on the slow and technical course along the Swan River. Brandon is a genuine talent and if he can keep his head down I believe he can be WA’s first ever distance running track Olympian. At only 18 years of age, there is a lot of water to pass under the bridge but watch this space.

Personally, the event certainly tested where things where at and with the quality field I managed to run around 10 sec quicker than I expected with a 15.16 for 3rd place.

I am a bit like an old boxer who needs to be clipped around the ear to fire up, so the little touch up is the perfect motivation for me at this point of my preparation for the European Championships in April.

Over the next 2 weeks a repeat 16km bike TT at Kings Park and then the Busso 10km are on the cards so starting to get into the thick of things and will keep you updated as the form starts to build towards some important races in March and April

Thanks for checking in,
Radar

I am currently up at Falls Creek in the Victorian Alps logging some big kilometres and accessing motivation and information from the great athletes and coaches up here for the annual pilgrimage.

I am fortunate to be staying with a great stable of athletes coached by Ken Green in Sydney and the quality of the group is really high both on and off the training track. My training has mainly been volume based and trying to take advantage of the 1700m elevation with good solid work on both bike and run.

The flat running trails up the top of the mountain are certainly easier than the bike, where climbs ranging from 7k-30k are abound. Training twice a day, it is not uncommon to see 60-100 runners at any given training session and the full range of ability levels from Olympic athletes to mothers and fathers up here with their children.

For more info on training up here, check out http://www.fallscreek.com.au/AltitudeTraining

Hopefully, in 2012 we can get a group of WA runners of all ages and abilities up here to share in the great culture that is present on the mountain.