Sunday 23 August 2009

Aths Waverley 1 hour race: 1st with 15.72km

A luxurious 7.30AM sleep in and two NoDoz tablets had me feeling good for the start of this event. It was a small field even for the club with only about 15 people turning up. All of the good runners hadn't bothered to come and the only two guys that could challenge me were stopping after thirty minutes, so it was almost a forgone conclusion.

I took it pretty easy for the first few km, chatting with James Atkinson (a 30-31:xx 10k runner who is recovering from an injury at the moment) and only started pushing the pace when he told me that there was just one guy in front of me. I technically took the lead after about 5k but was still pacing off James and Rick (a promising 15 year old with some impressive middle distance PBs) who stayed about 50 m in front of me until they both stepped off the track after half an hour.

From that point on I was alone. My legs were feeling pretty stuffed after the big week (105k in six days) I'd put in, but I realised I was in a position to break a few PBs if I maintained my pace, so set myself little goals for 8k, 10k, 12k and 15k. Went through 8k in 29:45 according to the Garmin; 10k in 37:15; 12k in 45:00; and 15k in 56:30. All would be PBs except the last one, but I'm not going to claim them because the Forerunner distance was about 300 m further than the official track measurement.

I ended up winning by over a km, having lapped second place three times (me thinks he went out a bit hard:P). My splits show I faded a little bit from km 9 to 14, but I was still feeling pretty strong and definitely felt like I could have maintained that pace for another 5k if I'd had people around me to pull me along.

So a good workout which shows I'm in pretty good shape to go sub 80 at the Burnley half in two weeks:) I'm basically going to get into taper mode from tomorrow. On Thursday I'm heading up to Falls Creek with my dad and brother for the Kangaroo Hoppet Birkebeiner XC ski half marathon. This was going to be one of my goal events, but unfortunately the lack of decent snow cover has meant I haven't got as much training in as I would've liked. I'm still pretty sure I'll get a PB though. All of the hill reps I've been doing will have prepared me well for 'The Paralyser' (a 2.5k steep hill in the middle of the race) and my technique was looking pretty good last time I went out.

It should be an enjoyable weekend away and the rest will be good for me after three hard weeks of training. I'll keep the volume down the week after that as well so that I'm fresh for the Burnley half and then I'll try to maintain 130k weeks until the Melbourne Marathon on Oct 11.

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Weight wise I haven't been doing too well. Got down to 63.6 kg two weeks ago, but I've been naughty since then and have been scoffing down bread and pizza. It's tough denying myself these foods when I really love a couple of pieces of toast in the morning, but eating a whole loaf of bread in one sitting like I did yesterday is really not good (once I start I can't stop!). So to get down to my goal weight I'm just going to have to completely remove it from my diet.

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