I ran City2Surf!!

Instead of setting the topic as "Gold Coast trip got cancelled" I decided to look at the brighter side of the situation. Tim´s brother got sick on Thursday and his doctor didn´t recommed him attending the trip. So since Tim and his mother didn´t wanna leave without him I didn´t wanna travel alone, either. As soon as I found out our trip wasn´t going to happen I ran to the UTS sports office to register for City2Surf (the running event I told about in my last post). The official registration had been closed earlier in the week, but I was promised I could join the UTS team as an unofficial runner, meaning I wouldn´t get a number, a medal or any of the treatment during the race. But I got my team singlet, which was the most important thing!

Since I had thought I wouldn´t be able to participate in City2Surf I hadn´t been running at all during the past 3 months or so. (Gym is much more fun, especially in the winter!) So I had no great ambitions regarding the race - I just wanted to enjoy being a part of such a huge event, and I had planned to alternatively run and walk the 14km-long race. I woke up early this morning to meet with other UTS housing runners at Gumal at 7.30am. We walked together to Hyde Park, that was already filled with runners wearing singlets of different companies, institutions and clubs. It was a beautiful morning that turned out be the most perfect running day :) The weather was really summery: warm (around 23C) and sunny with hardly any wind. We spent some time with some other UTS runners (there were over 200 students representing our uni!) taking pictures and just chatting. I had met these two nice girls at Gumal and was accompanied by them till the start of the race. The amount of people was unbeliable! It was over 46 000 people running/walking. People were divided into four different starting groups depending on their previous times and levels of fitness. Aimee, who works at the UTS Sport Office, kindly gave me a number of her friends who had withdrawn from the race. So I got to be an official runner after all, at the second to last starting group :)

UTS runners at Hyde Park

I ran most of the race on my own. I was accompanied by this guy who coaches the UTS hockey team for a few while, but after I started feeling like I was slowing him down I told him to go and run at his own speed. I took my time to enjoy the athmosphere of the thousands of people being active; either running or walking, enjoying the beautiful views over the sea, seeing some parts of Sydney I hadn´t seen before, being outside in the sunshine... It was really crowded in the beginning of the race and it took me quite a while to pass all the slowest people before I actually could start running. And I kept passing people, as well as people kept passing me, during the whole race. It got a bit easier run after the first 10km, though. The organizers were providing free water and Gatorade along the race, and getting a drink every now and then was refreshing. I didn´t think about my finishing time at all. I ended up finishing in 94min, without feeling tired at all. I kinda wish I had trained for the event, since with a bit of training and more competitive attitude I could´ve done alright. Anyways, I got a medal for participating. And a free Sunday Morning Herald newspaper :)

At the beginning of the race

The race finished at Bondi Beach, which was full of people! Some went for a swim, and a lot of runners just hung out there after finishing. Many organizations had their own marquees providing drinks and food for their runners. UTS had its marguee, too, and it took me almost an hour to find it. After I did, I talked to some other people about the race and ate a sandwitch. Then I took the bus and train back home, and I´ve been here since. I watched a bit of TV, Renar helped me with my tax returns and I tried to read my Human Resource Management textbook but could hardly keep my eyes open so I went to visit Cody instead. And now I´m going to bed!

(I didn´t have my camera at City2Surf but some UTS people took photos that should be posted online sometime soon. I´ll try to add some photos later on...)