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| What the hell's all this small nonsense? |
My hopes were high for a significant improvement on last year's time because I'd done - what I thought - was decent preparation. For the past few weeks, I'd done at least one run a week, plus I'd done some research into pre-race warm-ups. I got to the WRC early and did a slow jog, covering the 3k course in about 20 minutes. Then I stretched for about 10 minutes and made sure my muscles remained warmed up by keeping moving, right up to start time.
About 1k into the actual race, I was struggling. My breathing was much too laboured for that early stage of the course, and from that point onwards my running was based on sheer willpower, rather than technique.
I stopped running and walked three times during the race because of a stitch. I was going to do it again, fairly close to the finish line, but as I started to slow down I heard Chris screaming all kinds of abuse at me from the side, issuing several threats of a physical nature. Despite nearly causing me to soil myself, her motivational technique worked, as it forced me over the last few hundred metres.
I finished the race in 26:20. Last year's time was 25:51, so despite all the preparation this time, I ran 29 seconds slower. 12 months ago, the weather was awful, with heavy rain blowing into my face and obscuring my view. Today was dry and sunny, and a bit warmer than I would have wished for, but I'm not using that as an excuse.
I'm not sure if this was a failure of my pre-race training regimen, or if running simply isn't my thing. My strength has greatly improved over the past year, but perhaps at the expense of my conditioning.
2 comments:
you ran the 3km course BEFORE the run.....were you stoned???? No wonder your time was slower you nut job!!!
Ha! Well, I bloody realise now that it was a mistake, but I was trying to follow the advice in that website article. I actually did less than they suggested, but it added nearly half a minute to last year's time. Bloody useless advice! I guess I was trying to be too clever with my run, and I should have just stretched a bit before the race, then run like I usually do. If I do the race next year, I'll keep things simple!
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