27-05-2019, 08:48 PM
Race Day.
after a nervous 6 hours or so sleep i was up early in order to get down to London for this Big Event 10km. RR was steady at 50 when i woke up. I managed half of my breakfast oats!
I was very apprehensive about running this after such a long time out of the scene and running in general. As you can see from this blog, I have been on and off and fast and slow over the years. I haven't done many big events such as this - just a big regional half marathon. Anyway onto the interesting stuff
I was in the second wave of starters, it was a long nervous wait on the start line. My friend had hurt his ankle the day before but was on the start line with me after i had administered medical assistance as best I could to get him through it! Weather was good, started cool-ish and warmed up through the race, possibly hit up to 20 degrees C and on the tall streets of Westminster there was little breeze and breaks of sunshine gleaming periodically through breaks in the skyline. I set off at a steady pace and was on plan for the first km. The second was a little too quick for my liking so i over compensated in the third. I had left my friend on the start line but he somehow miraculously caught me up end the start of the third km. As the course narrowed and my friend struggling to hold the pace and me slowing to egg him on and try and keep him with me, the third KM was overly slow. From the water station at the start of the 4th km, which i took a bit on board, from that point I just seemed to get quicker. I was fully in control, breathing, form, energy expenditure. Everything fell into place nicely.
Now here is the interesting bit. I think some adversity helped me along here. I was wearing three trackers. Milestone POD, Garmin and fitbit. Normally i would say the Garmin is Mr reliable when it comes to distance and pace but today it was all over the shop. Every time I glanced at it the pacing was off from what I felt i was running. I know the fitbit runs a bit slow on pacing but today whilst I don't think the splits are wholey accurate on my training runs today they were probably more consistent to the kind of race i ran. I will post both sets below and let you see the difference. I didnt push myself to the absolute limit as that wasn't on the agenda, but I pushed pretty hard given that I realised with two km to go that sub :taped: may be on the cards! however it wasnt to be as my wind up was so long that I nothing left to steal back the extra few seconds needed from the slow 3rd km.
Garmin:
1 05:06.4
2 05:10.0
3 05:40.7
4 05:10.6
5 05:25.2
6 05:17.8
7 04:48.0
8 04:44.8
9 04:26.3
10 04:25.3
11 00:22.4
50:37
10.09KM
1st 5km 26:33
2nd 5km 24:04
fitbit:
1 05:05
2 05:09
3 05:48
4 05:15
5 05:12
6 05:06
7 05:06
8 04:39
9 04:39
10 04:27
11 00:10
50:37
10.05KM
1st 5km 26:29
2nd 5km 24:07
The milestone pod went beserk and only measured it at 7.5km!!
Average HR 150
Max HR 179.
7 mins fat burn zone
23 mins cardio zone
23 mins peak zone
CHIP TIME 50:36
Chip 5KM 26:38
According to official timings I ran a 23:58 last 5km!!
So pleased with that and do not know how I managed to wind it up like I did and carry that through to the end. There was plenty in the tank and whilst the last km was harder work than I thought it would be i still managed a few hundred metres of sprint finish.
Two things noted. First; getting over taken in the first 4km by maybe two thousand people because I was pacing myself was pretty demoralising but i knew I would maybe get a lot of them back later in the race. Secondly; having the ability to wind it up like that means you have to overtake A LOT of people in the last 5 km. At least 1000 people. this slowed me down a bit and perhaps to my benefit as I was able to carry the pace marginally faster km by km into the end.
In summary of the event itself, a great experience and 23000 entrants is really something to behold! A nice flat course but you need to be in elite section to run a decent time, too much human traffic otherwise.
So I have a question or two coach. Next race is a local 10 km event on 30th June. think its hilly course but its only a few miles away and gives me chance to do the closest race to my house that is on the calender. That means next cycle starts 12 June so a bit of time to kill in between. I could throw in half a cycle, do first 12 days or so to get those core elements into the legs and finish with the paced time trial as the marker for next cycle OR some sort of consolidation period and a few base miles to build up the endurance. What do you recommend?
Either way I shall be out for a gentle recovery run tomorrow/Wednesday.
after a nervous 6 hours or so sleep i was up early in order to get down to London for this Big Event 10km. RR was steady at 50 when i woke up. I managed half of my breakfast oats!
I was very apprehensive about running this after such a long time out of the scene and running in general. As you can see from this blog, I have been on and off and fast and slow over the years. I haven't done many big events such as this - just a big regional half marathon. Anyway onto the interesting stuff
I was in the second wave of starters, it was a long nervous wait on the start line. My friend had hurt his ankle the day before but was on the start line with me after i had administered medical assistance as best I could to get him through it! Weather was good, started cool-ish and warmed up through the race, possibly hit up to 20 degrees C and on the tall streets of Westminster there was little breeze and breaks of sunshine gleaming periodically through breaks in the skyline. I set off at a steady pace and was on plan for the first km. The second was a little too quick for my liking so i over compensated in the third. I had left my friend on the start line but he somehow miraculously caught me up end the start of the third km. As the course narrowed and my friend struggling to hold the pace and me slowing to egg him on and try and keep him with me, the third KM was overly slow. From the water station at the start of the 4th km, which i took a bit on board, from that point I just seemed to get quicker. I was fully in control, breathing, form, energy expenditure. Everything fell into place nicely.
Now here is the interesting bit. I think some adversity helped me along here. I was wearing three trackers. Milestone POD, Garmin and fitbit. Normally i would say the Garmin is Mr reliable when it comes to distance and pace but today it was all over the shop. Every time I glanced at it the pacing was off from what I felt i was running. I know the fitbit runs a bit slow on pacing but today whilst I don't think the splits are wholey accurate on my training runs today they were probably more consistent to the kind of race i ran. I will post both sets below and let you see the difference. I didnt push myself to the absolute limit as that wasn't on the agenda, but I pushed pretty hard given that I realised with two km to go that sub :taped: may be on the cards! however it wasnt to be as my wind up was so long that I nothing left to steal back the extra few seconds needed from the slow 3rd km.
Garmin:
1 05:06.4
2 05:10.0
3 05:40.7
4 05:10.6
5 05:25.2
6 05:17.8
7 04:48.0
8 04:44.8
9 04:26.3
10 04:25.3
11 00:22.4
50:37
10.09KM
1st 5km 26:33
2nd 5km 24:04
fitbit:
1 05:05
2 05:09
3 05:48
4 05:15
5 05:12
6 05:06
7 05:06
8 04:39
9 04:39
10 04:27
11 00:10
50:37
10.05KM
1st 5km 26:29
2nd 5km 24:07
The milestone pod went beserk and only measured it at 7.5km!!
Average HR 150
Max HR 179.
7 mins fat burn zone
23 mins cardio zone
23 mins peak zone
CHIP TIME 50:36
Chip 5KM 26:38
According to official timings I ran a 23:58 last 5km!!
So pleased with that and do not know how I managed to wind it up like I did and carry that through to the end. There was plenty in the tank and whilst the last km was harder work than I thought it would be i still managed a few hundred metres of sprint finish.
Two things noted. First; getting over taken in the first 4km by maybe two thousand people because I was pacing myself was pretty demoralising but i knew I would maybe get a lot of them back later in the race. Secondly; having the ability to wind it up like that means you have to overtake A LOT of people in the last 5 km. At least 1000 people. this slowed me down a bit and perhaps to my benefit as I was able to carry the pace marginally faster km by km into the end.
In summary of the event itself, a great experience and 23000 entrants is really something to behold! A nice flat course but you need to be in elite section to run a decent time, too much human traffic otherwise.
So I have a question or two coach. Next race is a local 10 km event on 30th June. think its hilly course but its only a few miles away and gives me chance to do the closest race to my house that is on the calender. That means next cycle starts 12 June so a bit of time to kill in between. I could throw in half a cycle, do first 12 days or so to get those core elements into the legs and finish with the paced time trial as the marker for next cycle OR some sort of consolidation period and a few base miles to build up the endurance. What do you recommend?
Either way I shall be out for a gentle recovery run tomorrow/Wednesday.
