5k Time Trial E.S. Marks Oval

Woke to find an eerie blanket of grey around the park and all of Sydney as I spent the morning working, decided to ditch the HuRTS 4 x 10 minute sessions and went with the 5k time trial that Angry Man Clyde Rozza was putting on for his students. I haven't been down to E.S.Marks Oval for years and I must say it’s pretty good now that they have relayed the running surface. Rolled up to find a calm Clyde (with his notebook & pencil), Enda, Shrink Sparks’, and Irish Phil.
Haven't run a track 5ks since I was about 15 and with no form to speak of I was happy to just sit in at first and run with Enda (who also was taking it easier due to his 3 week bout of flu). Felt pretty comfortable for the first k at 3.40 pace and was hoping to just hold that pace. Enda started to gap me around the 3k mark as I laboured a little for the next 1200 metres before trying to finish it off strong.
18.56 was the finishing time - far from great, but happy enough with the first attempt and will hope to bring that under 18 over the next 2 months.
Went through the ks as I saw then in;
3.41, 7.26, 11.16, 15.08, 18.56 although Clyde will let me know exactly what they were I’m sure.
Interesting point though - My G.P.S Garmin measured it at 5.39ks and Enda's at 5.33.........Wonder if the track is long? Knew my form faltered a little but surely I wasn't running in lane 7 at any stage :)
Good job Mikey wasn't there, he'd have stopped running half way down the straight when his Garmin hit the 5k mark and demand that Steve Jackson get down to remeasure the distance :)
Think Enda ended up with 18.21 (?) and was looking pretty strong especially on the second half of the effort.
Busiest man of the night though was Shrink Sparks’ who had set up a couch at the conclusion and was last seen at 11.30pm deep in conversation trying to sort Enda's troubles out.
Saw Flakey flying around as well knocking out his 1k reps - pretty impressive with his 3.25s he was telling me and he was keen to see if I was running Striders on Saturday and was looking at a little wager on the outcome?

An Eerie sight around the Duck Pond, Centennial Park.

E.S. Marks Oval under floodlights the home of last nights 5k Time Trial.

Sparksy trying to work out Enda's ongoing problems, (could be there a while mate)


Huge congratulations to Slim Sammy Agnew and his Palace boys overnight on making it back to the Premier league thanks to beating Watford. Delighted for him as I know he enjoys his footy as much as I do and know what it means to him. Having said that ( and he will hate me for saying this) BUT they will come straight back down next year, Can't believe they got promoted and only won 19 out of the 46 matches played and only won once in the final 10 or so. Ahhh well its good for Stoke next season as it's a guaranteed 6 points and sure to boost our goal difference when we play the Eagles :)

Cheers