Happily Ever After
Life in The Rural Retreat with a beautiful wife, three cats, garden wildlife, a camera, a computer – and increasing amounts about running
Earlier posts can be found on Adventures of a Lone Bass Player, where this blog began life. Recent entries can be found here.
The Heat Is On
by Russell Turner - 16:45 on 12 April 2018
Ten days to go and another run in the bag. The last few short runs are supposed to leave me energised and optimistic ahead of The Big Day; today’s left me even more apprehensive.
The Garmin didn’t help. On the last few runs I’ve found a nice sensible pace and set off today, with 70 minutes ahead of me, at what I thought was something similar. The Garmin’s pace indicator always takes a couple of minutes to settle down, so early displays of five- and six-minute miles didn’t worry me. My effort felt fine. However, after five minutes it was showing seven- and eight-min/mile with no indication of dropping to eleven any time soon. A hurried calculation involving time and distance travelled suggested I was moving at more than 10min/mile pace. This was not good.
The first mile, I learned after downloading the stats back at The Rural Retreat, was completed in exactly 10 minutes – I blame the Garmin. Its map also suggested I’d begun the run in the middle of a field. No wonder Matchgirl upgraded to a newer model. Subsequent miles were covered in 12+ and 11+ minutes; a hill and a headwind were involved so that sounds about right. I completed 10k in 73 minutes, which was fine. These final runs are supposed to be steady.
Come the marathon, should the Garmin let me down I’ll at least be able to keep an eye on the pacers who run with a flag on their back to tell you their finish time (and amazingly accurate they are).
Today’s (apart from the cool headwind) was among the warmest runs I’ve had but at 8ºC was well cooler than the 20ºC forecast for The Big Day. The afternoon was even warmer (the Retreat’s door has stayed open for the first time this year) so maybe I should have saved my run for then. Heatstroke and sunburn have not featured in my training. This may be to my disadvantage.
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