Das uber plan is ticking along nicely - though may be in for some modifications soon - but Sunday is 10k race day so its time for...
...das kleine plan!
If you'd asked me a couple of months ago what I would be expecting to do this weekend it would have been easy: something around or under 45 minutes. Then I got injured...cut back drastically on running...put on weight...and a couple of weeks back when I went round the course with a mate I found doing it in 54 minutes extremely tough.
Tuesday's run gave me some confidence though. I felt strong heading up the long drags and managed a decent pace - even though there were 2 stops to wait for others in those last 2.5 miles - but yesterday's run dented that a bit. I opted not to head to Kirkstall and instead took advantage of the last bit of daylight and did 5 miles on my own through the woods near home. It felt hard work and 9 minute miling felt more like 7!
I suspect I was just tired though and today I added a treadmill run of 3.5k onto the end of a tough Pilates class and included a couple of brisk kilometres 0f 7:00 mile and 7:30 mile pace just to remind myself what pace feels like.
I've also managed to find my km splits from last years race and mapped these against the course profile. I finished in 46:13 last year - 10s outside a PB on a far from flat course.
Putting that all together I've decided to be bold and have worked out pace targets for each kilometre that would bring me home in 46:46, on the basis that if I can sneak under those a PB could be doable.
I have no idea if I'm in that sort of shape, probably not, but why not try?
Bottom line I think would be that I'd be distraught at anything over 50 minutes, might expect 48 and anything close to a PB would be a major boost.
To give myself the best shot I'm doing no more running or similar ahead of the race. Tonight I have a sports massage on my legs and tomorrow a Pilates session cum massage but other than lots of stretching and nothing more.
1 comment:
I think the boost you can already take from this is the change in attitude. It's what might be referred to as a "soft skill" in this day and age - it's not like having a stronger core or a healthier CV system - but knowing your limits and working to them rather than in denial of them is what will ultimately make you a stronger runner.
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