Run > Race

Welwyn Garden City 10m. Pleased with this as I had pretty decent run up to 5 miles and then got a quite bad stitch but managed to just about hold it together in the second half to duck under 79 mins.

Today's objectives were to see how far I could break 80 mins by and how close I could get to 76 mins. Another objective was to remind myself that I CAN race in the morning and I CAN run well in the morning - something I wanted to do before I run the Leicester marathon in 2 weeks.

I believe that you can tell a lot from your immediate reaction when you cross the line, and when I saw my time my reaction was "ooooh that's not bad", but I knew that the stitch lost me a lot of time in the last 4 miles and I should have been sub 78. Not complaining though.

My strategy today was to run for as long as I could with my HR at 170-173 (90% max), whilst maintaining sub-8 miling. I maintained that for the first 3 or 4 miles, but then let the HR go up as I was feeling comfortable.

This was a crap course and I'm not sure I'd run this race again. The first half mile was around a grass field. After that we had to run on paths and cycle tracks. My elevation chart shows what I suspected - there were very few flat parts on this course, but there were no "hills" to speak of. It was continually rolling with endless ramps and underpasses and stretches of path that drag upwards and then went down again. There were also endless twists and turns and even gate to squeeze through. This course was a bit of a pain in the arse to be honest. That said, I enjoyed it more than some of those boring countryside routes.

Although my splits are quite shocking later on, I didn't get passed by anybody and I passed around 10 runners in the last 3 miles. Everybody seemed to be slowing down due to the endless rolling terrain.

The stitch was killing me late on and it was the closest I've come to vomiting on the finish line when I'd finished. Managed to produce a mighty kick at the end to pick off 3 runners in the last 150 metres - more evidence that I had more to give today. However, when you're running, bent in two and hyperventilating, it's hard to maintain a fast pace.

Av HR = 175

Split Summary

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1) - 1m - 7:42(7:42/m) - 163bpm avge - 172bpm max - 118cal

2) - 1m - 7:47(7:47/m) - 172bpm avge - 178bpm max - 118cal

3) - 0.01m - 3(8:14/m) - 177bpm avge - 177bpm max - 1cal

4) - 1m - 7:48(7:48/m) - 173bpm avge - 179bpm max - 119cal

5) - 1m - 7:54(7:54/m) - 176bpm avge - 181bpm max - 122cal

6) - 1m - 7:53(7:53/m) - 177bpm avge - 182bpm max - 120cal

7) - 1m - 8:02(8:02/m) - 178bpm avge - 182bpm max - 117cal

8) - 1m - 8:02(8:02/m) - 178bpm avge - 183bpm max - 119cal

9) - 1m - 8:21(8:21/m) - 178bpm avge - 181bpm max - 120cal

10) - 1m - 8:12(8:12/m) - 178bpm avge - 181bpm max - 119cal

11) - 0.99m - 7:12 (7:12/m) - 180bpm avge - 188bpm max - 107cal