Race Report: Seattle Craft Classic (half marathon)

Mr TOTKat and I discovered a while ago that it's really great fun to enter a local race when we go on holiday. And with the total lack of expectation on the day, we often pull out our best times - double win! 

Since starting a job which involves a reasonable amount of travel, I've had to find reliable ways of minimising/avoiding jet lag so I'm not a zombie all the time. Running is a fantastic way to combat jet lag! Going West; I stay up as late as I can and try to get a run in just before sunset. Then get up and out for a run as soon as it starts getting light in the morning. Getting daylight on your skin and eyes really helps sort out the rhythm of the day and every time I use this method I just don't get jet lag at all! Heading East again it's the same in reverse, get out and get a run in as close to sunrise and sunset as possible to help reset that inner clock. It really works!

The second thing running gives me when I travel is that it's a great way to explore a new location. This latest trip to Seattle, I found a local half marathon on the first Sunday I was there, which was planned to end at a local brewery! A great opportunity to get up and out and seeing the area! I was a bit surprised at the cost of the race entry; yes it was tiered by how close to the date you entered and I was entering the day before, but still. Pretty pricey!

A quick cab ride to the running shop on the day before the race, to enter, pick up race number and the race branded beer glass and t-shirt (adding even more to the overall cost! doh!). And, because I'm weak-willed, I ended up buying a new pair of 3/4 tights (for some reason I seem to have only one pair of training/racing 3/4 tights at the moment and they have a hole in them from when I face-planted in them a while back).

Anyway! The race! It was really low key and small. Just under 400 people ran the half marathon and 350 ran the 5k (which started in a different place, but also ended at the brewery). There were pairs of pacers for all of these race targets: 01:30, 01:40, 01:50, 02:00, 02:15, 02:30, 02:45 and 03:00. Which was really great to see - this race was taking itself pretty seriously in terms of quality even though it was pretty small. The bag drop, portaloos and pacers were the indications at the start and I figured out the big contributor to the price later on.

The course was all on "trails". There is a concept of trails in the USA that's different from what folks in Europe would expect. Given that there's a lot of road in the states, huge distances between things even in towns that mean folks drive almost everywhere, there's little walking facility to get from A to B. So what happens in a lot of places is that there are cycle/walk routes carved through the urban area which are usually made easy for accessibility in some way; tarmacced, gravel, packed sand etc. This is what they call a "trail" and in the case of this race route, that's what the trails were. So really good surface underfoot for running quickly AND flat as you like! The weather was absolutely perfect too. Clear, bright and with a slight chill in the morning. It was all lining up well for a good time for me, so I went into the race with a back-of-the-mind aim to cruise hard, making progress to equal my PB or beat it. 3 weeks back from LEJoG and I was feeling quite good in the legs and engine with some of the runs the week before, so why not?

So I set off smartly and set out to make progress without blowing up too early. The sun was bright, the air crisp and cool and the runners started to pull away, but I let it happen. This always happens with a large proportion of folks not being so great at pacing - Marathon Talk describe this phenomenon and the tide going out. And the thing about the tide going out, is that you know it'll come back in again later. It always does. So knowing this and having experienced it umpteen times, I didn't get too caught up in trying to keep up.

As it was on trails and no need for a whole lot of road safety costs, soon enough it was obvious where a large chunk of the cost of the race went. 5 photographers, with 4 clustered together at a point on the course where the half marathon runners and the 5k runners would pass twice, and the fifth strategically placed on a hill to catch the big efforts. At this point, I'd been following a lady who looked to be hitting a pace I liked the feel of; not too easy, not too spicy. The tide was already coming back in again from the 4th mile or so and it felt great for the first 9 miles - just under 9 mins/mile is a pace that I need to concentrate to keep the effort high enough, but no problem to maintain for a good length of time at the moment.

Each time I gently passed her, she'd step up the pace again having eased off a bit, and pass me again. It kept me honest for those 9 miles. Had she not been there, I'm pretty sure my concentration would have dropped and I'd've slowed down and ended up looking at the trees and the river more. But at about 9 miles, I passed her at a dead turn point on the course and never saw her again. There was a little undulation around that area and I was taking advantage of the very slight downhill gradient to get a little help from gravity and I think that's what did the trick. Mile 10-11 had a slight uphill gradient (as did mile 8), which sucked a bit of energy and from there the pace started to feel tough to maintain. Only 3 miles to the end and I was on track for a PB, so I kept the gas on.

Then in the last couple of miles I made some errors. From before half way onwards, my watch was disagreeing with the mile markers by about 0.1 miles.  My watch would tick over a mile marker, then 0.1 miles later I'd pass the physical one. It's never clear how accurate those markers are in a given race, so the doubts start to creep in about how long you have left to go. As my watch ticked over the 12 miles point, it was another almost 0.25 further on that I passed the 12 mile marker, so I thought I had almost 0.3 miles more to cover than my watch was telling me.

With the discomfort I was now in, I lost heart a little. I thought I was going to come in just under 2 hours by a few seconds, so I eased off a tiny bit and walked a few steps to adjust my t-shirt sleeves which were coming untucked from my bra straps (I'd tucked them in a couple of miles earlier because I was starting to overheat and needed a bit more surface area of skin available to cool down). Having had zero people pass me from after the first half mile, I now had a few folks go by. Not happy about that! Then the route twisted through some trees and up a couple of tiny little steeper slopes and I walked a few steps again there - I'd effectively given up in my head and, of course, it's your brain that gives up before your body. But then I heard the finish line! I turned a corner and it was literally only 100m to the finish! My watch just ticked over 13 miles about 200m earlier and I thought I had 0.3 miles still to go! Argh! So I sprinted over the line, hoping I'd not screwed it up too badly. My watch said 01:56:21! A PB!

No medals at the end because the race medals had been sent to a race in Florida by mistake and they were going to post them onwards to runners afterwards when they arrived in Washington (state). But there was a lovely picnic area with beer and food trucks on a field by the brewery and one free beer per runner (as long as you had ID to prove you were old enough - this is America after all!)

What great atmosphere with friends and family of the runners all getting involved. I sat myself on the grass by the prize giving area, where the pacers ended up congregating afterwards. I got to meet lots of local runners and felt really welcomed - fabulous atmosphere!

Official results later in the day knocked a couple more seconds off - 7th in my Age Group (and first non-US female athlete over the line :oD - OK there were only 2 of us and the other one was a Canadian! There were 2 Canadian men too.). Very pleased with a PB by 57s when I've really not been training for speed and had no expectations or target for this race until the day before it. Very pleased with my pacing (apart from the slight cock-up at the end). Cheers!

Race report: Seville Marathon 2016

The target was 03:59:59 and it was going to be a stretch.  For that time, I'd have to do 26.2 miles at only a few seconds per mile slower than my half marathon PB from September.  On average only 17s/mile slower including any congestion, water and/or wee stops.  Quite a big mental stretch especially given what happened at the Lee Valley Marathon in October (I stopped at 1/2 way as I simply couldn't keep any kind of pace (and my shoes were hurting)).  That and the last time I actually finished a marathon, I was 3kg lighter.

One of the streets on the route - I don't remember it at all, I saw a lot of yellow balloon...

Seville is also quite pretty.  I'd been there very many years ago with a university friend of mine and we mooched around the old part of the city but this trip wouldn't have much sightseeing really.  Arriving late on Friday, Saturday a lie-in and a trip to pick up race numbers etc. from the (not that exciting) expo - the expo at Rotterdam was muuuch better.  And then up early on Sunday to go run.

And that's what we did - via meeting some of @abradypus'  running club mates as well as some of the Centurion running team (including @jameselsons, my coach :o) ) at the expo and then for dinner.

Cutting a 4ish hour race story short - I set my watch for a target pace that would get me 03:59:xx and stood in the start pen right behind the 4 hour pacer with his enormous yellow balloon.  And I stayed mostly behind him for the first 30km (EU race, everything is in km), getting banged on the head every now and then by the balloon bouncing around and thinking "03:59:59" as a mantra.  Every time I started to doubt, thinking "03:59:59".

Ignore the total time - I stopped my watch oddly.

The pacer didn't slow through the water stations; someone else got a bottle and brought it to him.  So, as I slowed to take water every other aid station after the first 10km as the temperature rose, I had to catch back up to the pacer with a bit of extra effort.  Which got pretty tricky after a while.

I got to 18km and was really happy that I felt pretty OK - having had the wheels fall off at Rotterdam at 18km, I was worried that setting off at a spicy pace again this time could end the same way.  20km came and still good, 25km... 28km and a bit of grit started to be needed.  I was a bit fed up with having a balloon hit me quite so much, and some annoying short guy in a green vest cut me up every few km but was hanging on to the 4 hour bus still thinking "03:59:59".  There wasn't any shade from the sun any more and I was starting to get too hot.  30km... and I don't remember much until 34km when I was so hot I had to dump cup after cup of water over me, drenching me completely - at which point I peed myself quite thoroughly, which was a surprise.  At least it meant I was drinking plenty enough :o)  I had a massive maths fail though (unsurprisingly for while running), 8km to go... that's about 75 mins to the finish and looking at the time, I worked out that'd mean I'd finish around 04:12.  Not happy with that, I lost heart for a little while, but persuaded myself to try to get as close to 4 hours as I could.  Yeah.  Running maths.  Gotta love it.

I just about caught the 4 hour pacer up again after that extended, slow walk through the water station but at the next one I had to do the same again and totally lost the pacer.  Never saw him again after that.  As I'd thought I was looking at a best case of 04:08 (more fabulous maths) I walked a little up one of the alleyways shortly before the 40km mark, saw that marker and then made a deal with myself to run to the finish from there as it was only 2ish km.  My watch said 03:51:xx.  That perked me up a hell of a lot!  I still wouldn't make sub-4, but I'd still get close to 4.

26.2 miles on the watch, I hit the lap button so I could have a "technical" marathon time vs the race route time.  When I set up my watch for pacing, I set a pace range "until lap button press" but no cool down section.  I thought I'd hit the lap button and get a 26.2 Garmin split and then hit stop at the finish line itself.  What I totally forgot was that if you don't set a segment after the lap button press to end the main workout segment... IT STOPS THE TIMER COMPLETELY!  And I didn't notice that happen when I hit the lap button.  So when I rounded the running track, leap-frogging the walkers who were on the inside lane, and finally crossed the line I hit the stop button.

Weaving through the other finishers, I cursed a lot like I did at Rotterdam.  Though there were easily accessibly plastic blankets to keep us warm, the folks giving out medals were hard to find and there was no bloody water!  Why do race organisers do this!?  OK so there was a water station at 40km but I didn't bother with that one thinking I'd get water at the end.  Hah!

Weirdly, cadence dropped off more than pace. But you can clearly see where I slowed right down at the later water stations to cool down.

I needed to find MrTOTKat and wasn't sure where he might wait for me.  After wandering with other finishers for a little while, I decided to look at my watch to see what time I might have got.  It was still running!  Gah!  So I hit stop, not realising what had happened earlier.  It said 04:02:51.  Cor!

Little bit bloody - lottle bit stinking of piss at the end.

 I found MrTOTKat; he was quite light headed and both of us needed to get out of the stadium to somewhere less echoey and loud.  Grabbing a couple of finishers' goody bags (can of Coke, bottle of water, an orange and a chocolate wafer) we got out and sat down for a little while.  I even drank the whole can of Coke, which at the time was glorious!

The official finishing time being released revealed what happened with my watch at the end of the race.  I'd actually ended up stopping it when it thought I'd done 26.2 miles, it didn't record the next bit until I hit stop(start) at the finish line, so it then recorded while I was wandering around after the finish line until I saw that the timer was running and stopped it.

This race was much nicer than Rotterdam - staying near the start/finish was a great idea.  There were plentiful pacers, water every 2.5km-ish and no worry about running out of water or having to wait long between stations.  Road surfaces were a bit rough in places and sticky in the latter stages going through and after water/fuel stations but I'd be very happy to go back and have another go.  Sub-4 is definitely possible!

Race Report: Lancaster Castle Half

What just happened?

Race number two of the holiday and it was another "enter on the day" jobbie.  This time a half marathon that is 99.75% flat with a 30m uphill in the final 400m; a little sting in the tail for those on for a PB or a particular time.

The Lancaster Castle Half Marathon (and 10K) is based in Lancaster Castle (prison) in the centre of Lancaster.  This means very few loos for 500 registered runners on the day (we found a pair and timed it perfectly as a huge queue formed behind us almost the moment we'd found them).  As people were heading up the hill into the castle grounds, almost everyone was saying "do we have to run up this?" as they skidded up the cobbles into the castle grounds.  Yes, not only a nasty little hill, but paved with great, shiny cobbles; perfect for skidding about when walking never mind running up it!

We found a coffee shop back in town, just a couple of hundred meters away, once we'd registered and there was an hour before the, quite civilised, start time of 11am.  Lucky we did too, though the coffee was truly awful, there was a loo to be taken advantage of.  And we did.  A couple of times each at least - having scoffed curry and a few ales the night before, there was a bit to let go of before running for a couple of hours.

The race seems pretty popular with local running clubs as there were a couple of coach-loads turned up from two clubs; one in red and one in blue, Blackburn Road Runners and Red Rose Road Runners.  We chatted to one of the race officials (the bloke doing the timing) as everyone was walking to the race start area, and he'd said there were 500 runners registered between the half and the 10K but there was unprecedented no-shows with no particular reason why.

The race start was down in a field near the castle.  We all ambled down the path to the field to then completely not hear the run briefing at all, and then we were led to the actual start line.  I was about  3/4 down the bunch of runners as we walked to the start line and then people ahead were suddenly, without any warning, just running.  Nobody knew where the start line was or when we should have considered the race to have started, but we all just pootled off over a narrow bridge and down the road into a new housing estate by the estuary.

I wasn't sure how I'd be only a week after what I'd thought was a pretty peppy 10 miler.  I kinda wanted to aim for a sub 2 hour half marathon but given how I'd not wanted to get out of bed and didn't much feel like running hard and sucking up any hurt, I decided to take the first mile as a warm-up and assessment and see what that pace looked like before deciding what to do with the other 12.1 miles.  When the beep for the first mile came, 09:22 was a bit disappointing and I thought "oh well, no PB for me today."

My half marathon PB at 02:03:05 at another spontaneous holiday race two years ago, when I was about 4kg lighter and had quite a bit of Ironman fitness still going on, seemed a bit ambitious to break if the first mile was 09:22 and I did some sums (always a bad idea when putting out effort - you should see some of the spectacular basic maths errors I make in that condition) which told me that even if I held that pace, I'd be on for just about squeaking in at 2 hours 2 minutes and change, but with the 30m hill in the last 400m of distance it'd be touch & go.  So I mentally gave up and decided to just take a look every mile and see what happened.

The route was pretty darned boring really.  Along a tow path in a housing estate, with the estuary on one side, then down a tree/bush lined gravel trail to a turn-around point and onto a road, over the canal, down a long road through fields into a headwind to a dead turn point and back through the fields, over the canal and along a main road back to the gravel trail and into town again.  Not much to look at, but it meant for concentrating on the runners around you.

Each time my watch beeped, it was showing 08:xx per mile from 39 to 53 as a variation. I overtook *tons* of people.  Apart from one little woman all in black.  She overtook me at around 3 miles in and I couldn't let her go after that.  My legs felt fine and I felt fine, overtaking ones and twos and the odd cluster of runners, but always that woman all in black just ahead of me who I couldn't pull back in.  She kept me honest for about 7 miles until, by surprise, I finally overtook her on the main road back towards the trail, at around the 9 mile point.  I wasn't sure if it'd stick, but it seemed to and she looked to have slowed down and run out of oomph.  When I next looked down at my watch at a one mile beep, it turned out I'd speeded up and had just hit a 08:39 mile.  I did more sums.  A sub 2 hour time was well on the cards and if I felt like it, I could slow right down to 10 minute miles for the rest of it and still just beat 2 hours.  But I didn't want to do that.

I carried on reeling in the odd runner here and there and was a bit smug feeling that I'd get through this race with not one person overtaking me.  Hah.  A bloke in a green top and a black Camelbak sneaked up, not long after I'd overtaken the woman in black and he pulled away a little.  Nooooo! And a mile later I had him back again and he said "final push now!" as I pushed very slowly past him, breathing quite loudly.  I couldn't speak really, but as my watch beeped and I saw it saying 08:37 I blurted out "oh shit!".  I couldn't believe I was not only still holding sub 9 minute miles but that I was appreciably quicker than that.

Carrying on sucking up the feeling like I was putting in reasonable effort, I made that overtake stick and kept motoring until the final stretch of road by the estuary where I suddenly lost heart and slowed.  I had two more people to overtake; an old fella in a running club shirt and a woman in black & white vertical stripes.  I just managed to overtake the man, but I couldn't muster up anything to push enough to overtake the woman.  Rounding the corner to run along the field we started in, I really ran out of steam, slowed to 09:20/mile pace and then walked a couple of steps up the bridge over the railway lines before the final slog up to the prison.

She was back!  The woman in black!  Argh!  She powered past me up the cobbled road to the prison gates and there was nothing I could do.  Then as I went through the gates I heard yelling that someone was right behind me and I could hear him.  It was the bloke in green I'd overtaken a little while back.  No way was he going to be allowed overtake me in the final few meters, so I broke into a sprint and just pulled away from him to cross the line.

Smashed my half marathon PB, despite that evil hill at the end (though I clearly lost heart a bit before that).  Official time 01:57:16 - a PB by 05:56.  And I negative split by 38s.

I had a good chat with the woman in black and the man in green and thanked them for keeping me honest - it sounded like they'd had fun too.  And then it was awards time for the winners.  In keeping with the spirit of local races with prizes donated by local businesses, the overall winner got a microwave.

It was definitely time for breakfast by then, having had only a cup of tea at about 07:30 and a mouthful of crap coffee from the coffee shop before the race.  So we adjourned to a nearby pub for Sunday lunch - 2 pints of ale for me, and pea and mint soup with bread and butter, then roast lamb with a ton of veg and a Yorkshire pudding.

I'm pretty pleased with that race.  Being about 4-5kg heavier than I want to be at the moment (mainly due to wine), having had ales and curry the night before, having only started back running again 5.5 months ago, after 4 months off and learning to walk again in March this year and I was in the top half of finishers, top 25 of 86 women and 6th V40 woman out of 28, and PBing by pretty much 6 minutes (so just under 30s/mile faster every single mile for 13 miles).  Yeah, pretty bloody pleased with that indeed.

Knee over ankle in the loading phase :o)

BOOM! Green week!

It's been a while... and I've aaaalmost managed a green week this week.  (All planned sessions completed and as planned).

I missed it by a whisker by deciding to only do 10K at Clapham Common today rather than carrying on for the 3rd lap and 15K.  I had a target of 1 hour 20 minutes to beat to PB the 15km route, which meant a pace of 08:30/mile to hit that target.

I was really happy up to the 6th kilometer mark as the time I had on my watch meant that I was bang on target for that pace.  Then I convinced myself that I was dropping off pace dramatically at the half-way mark and gave up.  Phoned it in for the 2nd lap and retired after 10km instead of pushing on to 15. From the data I now have afterwards, I see a slightly different story and I just couldn't do sums under pressure (no change there - running makes my arithmetic get Special).  My pace wasn't as quick as I thought it was.  Averaged 08:48/mile for 6.2 miles on a very twisty course with a good few dead turns.

A bit annoyed with myself as I really didn't have any drive for this race.  I didn't manage to make it meaningful and I went into it convinced I didn't have the pace at the moment to hit a PB that I set last year.  So, clearly, I never was going to with that attitude.  Hey ho.  No biggie.  It's not my goal at the moment to be quicker at shortish things.

Consistent training though, so I'm very happy with that.  And next week looks like it's going to be fun.  Starting with an actual rest day on Monday after 11 days of consecutive training (not all running), and culminating in back to back 13.5 mile runs at the weekend (that look like they'll actually be more like 15 and 14.5 mile runs due to routing & railway station locations - probably Maidenhead to Staines and Staines to Kingston along the Thames Path).  That'll bring me to 43 miles of the 184 mile route recced; with full pack as planned so far.

We're 5 weeks out from Round Ripon (35 miles) and 7 out from my Thames Path tour.  More weeks like this week and I'll be well set up for both.

I wish I knew (Race Report: Thames Turbo Sprint #4 2013)

Bank holiday Monday.  Thames Turbo Sprint Tri day!

Vicky Gill - Ladies Winner and setting a new course record

Usual 04:30 alarm; up, brekkie and off to park and register by 05:45.  This race, I was in the 4th wave of starters and quite far down that wave for start time.  [Start time at these races is seeded by overall estimated completion time, wave 1 being slowest, 4 fastest; then by estimated 400m swim time, fastest first in the pool.]  So from registration time, I had a 2 hour wait before getting into the pool to start.  Thankfully there were some nice people around to chat to, both competitors and spectators (thanks Rowe family, @abradypus, Danny), so the 2 hours passed relatively quickly.

I had my usual "I don't feel like this; I don' wanna get in the pool" minor funk before getting in and getting on with it.  My swim was pretty average and uneventful and for all my whining that I hadn't re-set my estimated swim time to something sensible, I was in a perfect spot in the swim - the guy in front never showed me his feet and the guy behind never got close.  I popped out of the pool, trotted into transition to my bike, which was nicely racked towards the end of a rack.

Shoes on, number belt clipped on - ARGH! IT'S SO LOOSE! - I tried to adjust it but the little loops that hold the loose ends were jammed into the plastic buckles and stopping me from getting it any tighter.  I tried a few times, managed to get it a little tighter, enough that it wouldn't just flap around on the bike, and then gave up.  Helmet and glasses on. Trot out to the bike mount line at the pedestrian crossing.  More errors!  I skidded about a bit trying to clip in my shoes and then was in a silly low gear as I spun up the wheels on the spur down to the main road.  I decided not to get down on the bars for that part as the traffic can be unpredictable there and I just spun out at a high cadence all the way to the junction before turning out onto the main part of the course, getting down on the bars and then getting into a better gear.

It was time to put some effort in, so off I went.  Slowing slightly for the roundabout at the short-end turn point, I started to wind it back up again for the run back down to the church and on to the flight of mini roundabouts in the villages.  Argh again!  There's a right-hand turn at a narrow point in the first village where there are often vehicles turning right.  Coming up to that junction was a very slow cyclist, with a bus stuck behind it, which also wanted to turn right.  No way to over or under-take the bus as there was no room and it was turning right, I had no option but to ease off the pedals and wait for the bus to turn right.  Argh!  It had to wait for 2-3 cars to go past on the other side of the road before turning!  Never mind; on with it down to the left at the traffic lights.  No further incidents on the bike, strong, confident cycling down to the far end roundabout turn and then back, into a reasonably fierce head-wind.  I was over-taken by one, two, then three men on squashy bikes with whooshy wheels, but the third one (511) was only just pulling away.  He might be catchable!  A peloton of bank holiday cyclists went past me and interjected between me and race number 511.  They sat there for a bit, pulling away from me very very slightly and then eventually overtook 511.  Who then eased off!  Catchable!  So catchable, I eased off too.  Bah!

I caught him just as we eased into the bike finish funnel and then off to the non-compete zone back to T2.  We had a bit of a chat and I said I'd been hoping to go sub-40 minutes on the bike that day, but the wind and the bus had certainly put paid to that.  Oh well!

Back to T2, bike racked nicely in a huge gap where the people around me hadn't got back yet.  Shoe swap, helmet off, sun-visor on and off to the run out from T2.

And I felt -GOOD-.  Really really good.

Trying to run through the stitch, but not doing well
(Thanks to David Rowe for the photo)

Trotted down the road to the park entrance, being overtaken by 3 people who were quite nippy.  Into the park, up to the first km marker and then... oh dear god, the worst stitch known to humanity hit my right side.  I slowed to a walk and stopped.  Tried to breathe it out but it wasn't going, so started walking and trying to massage the muscles.  This was not good at all.  It just wouldn't shift and then eased a little, so I started to run again, legs feeling absolutely great, but the stitch sharpened again.  I passed Mr TOTKat and @abradypus at the water station and quite vocally explained my predicament as I passed them.  It went on; run, walk, run, walk for the next 2km up to the corner which was just under 2km to go.  I don't know if it was Rob telling me "just under 2km to go" that made the magic happen, but the stitch went away completely and I started to run properly again.  It just felt so good in the legs and lungs I really wish that stitch hadn't happened.  I motored on in to the finish line and stopped my watch.  01:21:27 - I'd started it early in the pool and it included the non-compete zone between bike and T2 so I had no idea what my overall time was.  I really wanted to beat 40 minutes on the bike and really wanted to beat my previous PB of 01:16:14, but was pretty sure I hadn't.

After a chat with Liz Pinches and Richie Thorpe, @abradypus, Mr TOTKat and I ambled back to the pool for some tea and a bacon roll.  I went to print my results while Mr TOTKat scored tea and food up in the cafe.  And there we go.  I smashed my bike PB, by 3 minutes, despite the bus and the wind.  And I beat my overall PB by just under a minute too, despite the awful run and average swim.  3rd in AG, which is OK I suppose.  7th woman on the bike overall, which is OK I suppose.

Not a bad day, not the best day, but I'm thinking Zell Am See may well turn out interestingly.  Hopefully I'll've got all the crappy luck out of the way and no more stitches!

I really really wish I'd not had that stitch; I wish I knew what the run could have been.  I'm thinking it could have been around 25 minutes, but I'll never know.

Fat-fuelled 5km Time Trial

This week's training plan had two tests in it; one 5km running time trial and an FTP bike test.  At the moment I can't do the FTP test as I don't have power measurement on my bike (and I don't get on with the Wattbikes well enough to use those - just can't seem to set them up nicely).  So, I went to the athletics track yesterday to do my 5km time trial.  It was shut.

I've been to the athletics track about 10 times and 3 times it's been shut.  The council web site says it's open 9am to dusk on weekdays, so I sort of expected it to be open.  So I went home, gave in and phoned the council.  You see, I've looked at the web site about it and it has the usage times and costs and I'd never seen anyone taking money or anyone around to give any money to the times I'd been and it was open.  The lady on the phone at the council told me that you have to pay at the tennis kiosk and someone comes to open it for you.  Thing is, right, there are two notice-boards at the track, one at either entrance.  And neither of them mentions opening times or where to go to pay or the fact that you need to go to the tennis kiosk.  *sigh*

So today I went to the tennis kiosk.  And there was no-one there either.  Though there was a park warden around who seemed to be someone I could pay - though he asked me how much the fees were, which didn't really instil confidence.  I paid my £4.50(!) and he let me in to the track.

V. cold today

15 minutes of shuffling 'round the track, in the freezing cold, as a warm up, then some strides for 6 minutes then I hit the lap button on the Garmin to start the 5km time trial.  Long story short, there was a gap in the trees at the end of the 100m straight, so there was quite a head wind running down that section, otherwise one of my socks rubbed a bit some of the time and I had the usual "I don't feel like this, I'm going really slowly and I feel horrible, why don't I just call it a day" thoughts around 3km into it but persuaded myself to carry on.

Chuffing like a train for the last lap, 12.5 laps of lonely foot tapping around the track, and my 5km was up.  I hit the lap button again and shuffled back to the start of the lap to pick up my woolly hat and fleecy jacket and jogged down to the tube station to go home.  I felt sluggish, but fine.  No problem banging out my fastest 5km ever and it's 3 months after I decided to go low carb/high fat.

And here we are.  My first properly hard 5km fuelled by fat and the splits are like this:-

Splits 4-8 are the 5km distance with a total time of 22:36.  I calculated that on the train on the way back and didn't really believe it until I did it all again properly at home.  That's 01:31 faster than my PB that I set back in October 2011, with a WAVA Age Grading of 62.8%.  Today's run gives me an age grading of 67.7%.  That's... quite pleasing really.  It also helps to give me an idea of what I could aspire to if I trained for other distances...

There's no way on god's earth I'd manage 04:15-04:20 for Sunday's 50km run.  It's a long way.  I've not trained for the distance (or even a marathon, or even a half marathon).  Plus there's the getting lost bit too.  Knowing a route like the back of your had makes quite a difference to overall time.  Still, I can dream :o)  I'd really love to break 6 hours if I'm honest.