I have kept a sort of training diary that I will publish next, it was written ‘live’, and is mostly just the training routines and minute observations about every single niggle, pain, injury and doubts as they happened during the 19 proper weeks of training (you could argue I started a little earlier, but those were the weeks when I followed an actual plan), but it needs editing. So for now, I will just recall race day and a few observations at the end of that particular journey.
After the last extra and improvised training session on the Thursday (roughly two miles at what was meant to be race pace, with a few 30s accelerations included at regular points), I thought I was having a little trouble recovering, but overall I slept pretty well that week. Judging from the data (see below), it was possibly the best week of sleep I’d ever had. Not that it was a lot of deep sleep, but somehow, I managed to do enough.
I was determined to follow good practice, so loaded on glycogen and carbs for a couple of days but not so much the evening before the race. Anyway, so I followed this or that tip that I had not tried during practice, and hoped for the best. Fetching the bib could be done on the Friday or Saturday but I opted for the Friday about lunch time (I was working from home that day), to avoid any kind of stress the day before the race. As it is, one last very fast walk before race day was a small gamble but OK (in the rain), only Nottingham Forest fucking up stupidly in the last second vs Liverpool brought a bit of stress. Anyway, so yeah, preparation before the race was OK, no big pain despite the previous week’s scare, and the final night while not the best, was good enough, I went to bed early. Apparently it’s the night before last that is the most important, and also during all my training, I’d finally learnt that even if I wasn’t completely sharp, as long as I was trained, I could overcome a little mental strain or a difficult night. As it is, it didn’t even come to that, and when I woke up on the Sunday morning (about 7am?), I didn’ feel bad at all.
In fact, as I’d been slightly concerned about my resting heart rate mostly not going below 50bpm after my extra fast but intense training session, I had been wondering if I was in top condition before the race. But luckily, as I woke up, I checked my data and I’d managed to go down to 45bpm (so averaged over at least half an hour) near the end of my sleep, and that reassured me – as a side note, it took me, for various reasons, three weeks to feel back to normal that way after….
Quick unusual brekkie, muffin, pancakes and a banana. I had prepared my gear the day before of course, including a bag in case I’d feel like it was the best option if I was up early, but I didn’t hesitate too long: the bag deposit place was (logically) near the finish line, but that was still at least a 15 min walk from the start, so I thought it wouldn’t be such a great idea, as I wanted to avoid any unnecessary stress. The only other decision that was very last minute was whether to take my mobile phone or not. I had run the distance with it in my pocket mid-December (on my best half-marathon effort that wasn’t even meant to be near race pace), so knew I could bear it even with gels in pockets, but decided that it could still slightly incomfort me, and wouldn’t optimise the sensations. I knew there was a good chance that at least Ben would be at the finish (since he’d asked me what time I was scheduled to arrive), but I thought I’d leave that to (unlikely) chance, and that, as I was keen to perform, I had to put my own comfort first and foremost this time. So, long sleeves (seemed necessary and most of the training was done in that), shorts, and I had settled on the lightest of gloves, thinking I could discard them during the race if they weren’t needed. Oh yes, the weather? About 5°C but, importantly, dry unlike the day before when it hadn’t stopped pouring.
So, anyway, my departure ‘sas’ as a ‘1h50’ target person was to be filled allegedly from Rue Saint-Jacques at 9.04 for a 9.19 start (the elite runners were starting at 8am so would have arrived before I started), but I had no idea how this truly worked. Can’t say I remembered how it was exactly 18 years ago, but that was also starting from Vincennes, and I was in the 2h (or more?) ‘sas’ so different thing.
Can’t remember what time I set off, but I knew I would have enough margin. Few people on the platform at that time of the morning on a Sunday, but quite a few of them were clearly going to do the run. Despite what the blurb said, it seemed to me that alighting in Saint-Michel and walking first along the Seine would be the quickest way (it was). I’d just pocketed a banknote (or so I thought…) possibly for a drink after the race or something if I’d bumped into familiar faces. The RER was thankfully running smoothly so no extra stress, even though monitoring my HR during the journey into town, it felt it was slightly higher (around 70 mostly) than it should be though the few seconds I got around 60 told me it was fine if not ideal.
After exiting the RER, I figured I might still need one piss (I had drank correctly, something I don’t always do, but I’d read it was necessary), so I went for a coffee (not necessarily recommended) thinking I’d use the loo there. Except just after having ordered I realised I couldn’t find the tenner I thought I had (and to this day I still have no idea where it is, didn’t find it at home either), I felt shit and guilty so apologised to the barman but I really had no way to pay. He shrugged and said ‘you’ll pay next time’, but obviously it’s not a place where I go often (well I went there once the summer before with Steve for a cocktail as the beers were ridiculously priced). Obviously, guilt also meant I didn’t feel I could decently used the loo. So I walked a little further, unsure what to do, until I spotted a very tiny side-alley where one guy was about to leave having just pissed. Seemed like a decent if smelly spot, needs must, so I settled for that useful piss before heading to the entrance of my ‘sas’. On the way, there were obviously shit loads of people, some doing warm-up runs and stuff, while I was just walking coolly. That required only a few tens of metres walk back on Boulevard Saint-Germain, so not quite where it said, but despite the time being only about 8.45am, they were clearly already admitting people in, so in I went.
The ‘walk’ to the line was quite lengthy. Again, I had no idea how that would be. There was kind of a first ‘stop’ with some people on a podium doing kind of dance/warm-up moves with music and inciting people to crouch, etc. and lots of people doing the moves. What? Yeah, I’m afraid that’s when I realised I’m not really the typical ‘runner’ . I’m still a footballer doing runs for fitness and with no particular intention to do more races after that one. I prepared myself seriously, nearly professionally, on many aspects, training, no alcohol, and food/nutrition for the last week, but my target was just THERE. Oh yes, what target? Officially I was in the ‘1h50’ slot, and if you’d asked me, I was always reluctant to say my target was lower than that. My official target from the training was 1h46, but given circumstances, never having done that for 18 years, running among thousands of people, I didn’t think I could do it. Or rather, I was dubious. At least, I’d slept OK-ish so that wouldn’t be a factor. But during all the long distance trainings, even with taking energetic gels (not doping, it’s perfectly fine), I’d kind of always faded after 15km, and always pretty badly (bar that one run in december when it was the uphill at 19km that really killed me), despite not running at the race speed and thinking I was taking it easy. Sure, it was practice, and say, when I ran 30km, I didn’t set myself to run 21km so it’s different. Still think it’s the nutrition preparation, filling up energy levels that made a difference in the end. Sure, the training indicator from Garmin said ‘very confident’ for reaching my target, but basically my view before the race was: ‘more than 1h55: catastrophe, between 1h50 and 1h55, meh but not surprising, between 1h48 and 1h50, decent, between 1h46 and 1h48, happy!’. Better than ‘1h46’? Well, I wasn’t completely envisaging it, yet, OK, I can admit, I was secretly hoping I could do it, both due to running all the training sessions faster than intended, and also vaguely because one colleague I play indoor footie with told me I’d do better than I thought on race day, with the adrenalin and all.
Anyway, so yeah, we passed that firsr series of people and could already hear ‘now the start will be given 5,4,3,2,1, go!’. But it wasn’t 9.19 and we were way off the end of the Boulevard where the start line was, so I was like wtf? And we continued moving only slowly bit by bit. All very stop/start. Sure, it’s just waves of starts, but I didn’t realise that. The 1h45 bunch was meant to start half an hour earlier but, clearly that was not how it worked, I mean not ‘all who are part of one sas being released progressively but in one huge wave’ as I thought it would be. Another note time-wise, even as I was just walking down rue St Jacques from the river earlier, I’d heard someone said the start was delayed by half an hour or so. It clearly was nonsense, because everything was pretty much spot on time, but I’m guessing that might have been more of a reflection of the way the start works. Unless they were told so about the 2h people or such. After all, about 48 thousand people took part in the race overall! Anyway, we passed some street urinals that were just for the race, but despite the small temptation, I decided that one piss had been enough, and that also I didn’t want to be further back. I knew I wouldn’t be quite in the first 1h50 starters, but probably not too far. So yeah; 9.19 came and the start there (another 54321 countdown didn’t release us), but eventually we got to a line of people who were kind of counting and lifting a cordon to let limited numbers through, and that’s when I knew I was in the next wave. I prepared the timer (I had two watches, as one was used for the training, the other I’d used before, and believe it or not, they proved to be both useful, as one displayed my instant speed in a more readable way, while the other informed me of my time every 2.5km as I’d set it up), and stopped looking at the clock. So yeah, during all my long runs, my references were per 2.5km. I’d set that up because I didn’t want to have a per kilometer time as it would be too much, but 2.5km sounded good to me. You only get 8 updates and then you have just over 1km left. Also, in my ‘dream’ target of 12km/h, that made it easy: ‘I needed to keep around 12’30 per 2.5km. I hadn’t checked precisely with regards to the target, but I think 1h46 was just about that too, maybe slightly under 12km/h but really not much.
And so I started running at 9.22am (only found out that was the starting time when I got the results). Whether I was in the first few hundreds of the 1h50 or not, it’s impossible to say. The stream of people on the streets was neverending, so quite clearly, if there is over half an hour between the 1h45s and the 1h50s, it’s because that’s the time it takes to make all the 1h45 start. There is NO gap between the two lots.
There’s actually not much to say about the race itself, given how swimmingly it went. I settled into a rhythm quite quickly. I was mentally prepared for the first 2.5km to be more about 12’45 at best, what with the start and all, but I was already under 12’30 to my surprise. But I didn’t decide that I should calm down in case I didn’t have the energy to last the distance at the pace. I just decided that I would keep the settled rhythm and see how far it got me. Of course, occupying the road was the big problem: given my speed/starting group and the people around, I found myself overtaking people far far more than I was being overtaken. So I had to go left/right depending where the space was. The experience of 18 years before helped me on that in a way, as I knew I had to be careful not to waste energy with small sprints to run into gaps between people. As it is, during the whole of the race, I think there were possibly only maybe three or four times when I had to force the pace a little to run into a gap. But I made sure these were not violent accelerations, and it didn’t cost me energy. Only once did I feel I might have made a small mistake in changing directions, which owed me a little ‘ho’ from a guy behind me somewhere when entering Bois de Vincennes. I’m not sure if it was the guy I will subsequently call ‘Pepe’ (because he made me think of the portuguese footballer called that), but I had a feeling it was.
Various thoughts occur during the race, but I was pretty much focussed on the time all the time. One of the first things that struck me (maybe just two or three kilometres in?) was a young woman near-hysterically shouting ‘Allez Olivier, vas-y!’ to my surprise. I thought, oh maybe there’s just someone she knows right behind me. Until I realised that names were on bibs and that it was in fact likely that she was encouraging me! In fact, after that, there were a good half-dozen people or (probably) more who encouraged me by name despite being complete strangers. And I’ll tell you what, it’s really really nice and it helps! The amount of people on the side, even if you can’t really see them (especially in the last 5km), all the bands playing, the occasional pom-poms, the fire brigade (with or without instrument, but in groups), that’s actually a big bonus. So if I thought before the race that maybe running on your own on a set circuit you do seven times was easier than in a race with thousands of people on a course you don’t really know (I mean I knew a fair few bits of it in Paris), I’m not sure at all now. I suspect the opposite.
Despite the previous days’ heavy rain, the course was rather dry, only a puddle or two in Bois de Vincennes, but as we stuck to the tar road, that was just on one side for instance, and the place was wide enough for there not to be any bottleneck overall. The course itself had a lot more up and down sections, which I had not anticipated at all. Especially in the second part you notice them more, there was a good downhill when I could feel I was gathering speed, and the last one or two uphills felt a little more difficult. The overall data seemed to show that those last uphills affected the pace, while I was flying over the first ones. The other thing with the sheer amount of people, is that on the bits when you could see uphill ahead (I think especially around km15 maybe?), you felt it was so crowded that maybe there would be a slowing down and you wouldn’t be able to go through at your speed. But the truth is, as everyone is running (and I suppose where I was, while speeds were variable, they were probably less variable than at the back of the field), it’s not really an issue and there was always enough space.
One thing to speak about are the ‘ravitaillements’ (feeding stations? don’t know what the technical term is, have to check back). There are three along the course, roughly at km 6/12/18. Pretty sure I’d eschewed them 18 years ago, probably a bad idea on top of all the bad ideas then. So this time, part of my ‘strategy’ was to have a gel of one kind or another every 5km or so (possibly delayed the first to be near the ravitaillement), especially as in most long runs I had the first after 9 or 10km and maybe that was already too late, and also to have some of that water at the ravitaillement. As I didn’t/couldn’t carry a drink with me, too big for pockets, I only had a very very tiny flask (from a Christmas cracker, heh), filled with whisky. No, I’m joking, during training runs it was water, during the race, I had some bonus kind of glucidic drink in it, but that’s still probably only three sips. So yeah; the stations were indicated (albeit confusingly, because the announcing signs had an arrow on them, which I thought would indicate which side of the road they were, but that was totally confusing, because I think they were always on the right, even when the arrow was pointing to the left…). I was fearing there’d be too many people and a slow down, but thankfully not. Whether it was because people were skipping them (bad idea as mentioned above) or because they were so well prepared they were carrying their ownd drinks – some people run with a bag or belt with stuff -, there was actually no problem, so all three times I managed to either grab a bottle on a table and get one of the people who were handing them out (always open), small bottles, easy to take a few gulps from, and then there were big bins you could throw them in – think on the first one it might have bounced off though. So very minimal loss of time really, and a very helpful (I guess) water supply.
Back to the race itself, I managed to keep a steady rhythm. The first few 2.5km were done in respectively 12’25/12’20/12’10/11’58. So yeah at km 10 I was way ahead of my target, couldn’t believe I’d just swallowed the last 2.5km in less than 12 minutes! No bad signs, no pain anywhere, it was looking good (note that I had taken a Ibuprofen before the race just to make sure, was wearing the little pad to protect the metatarsal on the right foot, but had decided that the ankle support bought only the past week after the CERN trip (see training diary) would be more impairment than help). I couldn’t really focus on a runner or another. Except ‘Pepe’ for a bit (see above). During most of the run through Bois de Vincennes he was there or thereabout (so maybe km 8 to 12 or something). I noticed him a little ahead of me after the incident mentioned above, I wasn’t going to let his pace influence me, as I was focusing on mine (by the way, the indications from the watch were obviously fluctuating a lot, but they were mostly encouraging, nearly always under 5min/km, I was a little concerned every time that strayed over, but that was rare, and only mostly between km 17 and 20 maybe) but he seemed to always be just in front of me or on the side. I lost him for a bit, and then saw him again maybe when entering Paris or was it only past Château de Vincennes (it’s pretty much all urban after that I think-map now suggests maybe not, the way we go back into Paris)? And then I lost him again, but I was so focused on my race, I have genuinely no idea if he went further ahead or if I left him behind. It’s somewhere on the section in Bois de Vincennes that I caught up with the 1h50 ‘flag bearers’. They’re supposed to be pacers for the designed time, but I guess they only start with the first wave of that allocated time slot. So I knew very well that when I overtook them, I was well below the 1h50 target time. But it was good to catch them.
Unlike 18 years ago when the second 10km was a long agony, I managed to keep a decent rhythm, re-entering Paris etc. made the race different again. Also, occasionally (particularly noticeable on the straight out of the Bois) you’d have an ambulance or SAMU on the way, some people would have been unwell, I was just hoping it was not like when I did Paris-Versailles (2004?) and someone died on the course. Nobody died apparently, so that’s good. 12’07, 12’07 got me to 15km still strong. 12’11 to reach 17.5km was a big one, no apparent weakening, not only had I never run that fast over 17.5km, but I was not feeling close to breaking point. Sure, my breathing had been a bit laboured from before km 10, but it was not affecting performance. It became a little harder after that, the few uphills were more keenly felt, but the target was nearly in range. The odd encouragement was still there, and some of the fun too. Some of the added ‘jeopardy’ back in Paris was people wanting to cross the road. I think there were dedicated places for that, but with the density of runners, it was very tough for someone to cross the road without being a dangerous obstacle. I only remember one slightly iffy moment though of no consequence when I had to slightly alter my course.
The entertainment continued: on a tunnel on the quays, they had put a speed trap (13.2km/h it said, whomever it was timing given the number of people, probably no-one), and there was a policeman blowing his whistle and randomly pointing at people pretending to arrest them. Made me smile before attacking the next ramp up from the riverside. The route went past Hôtel de Ville and my most familiar haunts on Rue de Rivoli/Saint Antoine, but really the focus was on arriving, I could not admire the scenery, just registered it mentally, that was about it. 20km were reached, the last 2.5km having been run slower in 12’47 (so 5’07 per km, the only time over 2.5km when I was slightly under target), but I’d known long before that I was so far ahead of my target that a little dip (this one was partly due to uphill —thought not violently so— portions) could be afforded. As it is, it wasn’t even a big drop in pace, and once you reach the 20km arch anyway (well a bit before), it’s all flat and you know you’re nearly there. So no, I didn’t fade or crumble badly, sure I grimaced a lot more towards the end, and the last 100m when you enter place de La Bastille are a little confusing, but I strained, nearly felt I was cramping up trying to accelerate (but quite frankly, after 21km at that pace, I had absolutely no ability to truly sprint) and stretched to the finish line. Done. Last km and a bit was actually run at 4’41 per km so faster than any of the 2.5km sections on average. Meaning I truly had not faded and had enough reserve to pick up a little speed again in the end. One look at the watch on the finish line suggested my time was under 1h44 so I was more than happy. Official time turned out later to be 1h43m29s. Much much better than in my wildest realistic hopes (OK, I’ll concede, I thought maybe, but I didn’t think I was being realistic, I thought I might have been deluding myself, despite all the training suggesting I had the potential). On crossing the line, I briefly bowed and put my hands on my knees, but I didn’t feel dead. One of the guys asked ‘are you OK’?’ which prompted me to say ‘fine!’ and stand again, as I remembered some people could be feeling quite bad so better not waste good people’s possibly medical attention when others need it. A little euphoria took me, not at having finished, but at having achieved my target and more. Nobody to really share it with on the spot was a shame, but really I was over the moon and ecstatic. Not sure the photos show it, but I’ll post some below, as well as some of the stats (you will see that while I mentioned pace per 2.5km, the pace per km was actually pretty steady too). On arrival you could go straight on or right, but I went right as it seemed to make more sense for taking the metro home. Picked a banana, a protein drink, water (all quickly swallowed), a medal and a bag on the way out, vague hopes of seeing Ben or others didn’t materialise, I noticed a guy stretching and thought I’d better not forget to too, so paused a couple of minutes to stretch before slowly heading home. Getting down the metro was a little uncomfortable, but unlike 18 years ago, no cramps. Home for a shower, lots of messages to share my happiness about the performance. Turned out Ben, Ale and Shep had been near the finish line and saw me (but I couldn’t hear them or see them obviously in the effort and noise around), but they’d stuck to the other side so no chance of seeing them on the right.
Good news were that they were staying out a while, so I could join them after a shower. Did I regret not taking my phone? Briefly, but in fact no. If I’d had my phone or left a bag and had it there, then I’d have stayed out straight after the race, and given the plans would have remained unshowered and in gear for the whole of the afternoon and evening. Not very good. As it is, I could enjoy time out but being dressed as a ‘civilian’, just taking my medal for show. So yeah, I didn’t even do the wise thing which would have been to get something substantial to eat, straight out to Rue Vieille du Temple for a couple of glasses of white wine. On the way, on rue de Rivoli, I was amazed to see that the race was still going. In fact, given the organisation’s cars that were behind, I think I just caught the very last runners. I took a small video, and in fact on seeing a photo later of the last couple who officially arrived, I’m pretty sure those two were in my video. So there you are, the pros arrived before I left, but I still had time to finish, go home and shower not in a hurry at all, be back and the event was still ongoing! Shep and Ben went home, while with Ale, we went to Corcoran’s to meet a few of the football team folks and watch Man City vs Liverpool. I had about six Guinness and still no food, before deciding to call it a day, pretty drunk but still feeling quite well and happy. Salmon bagel once home and then sleep.
Two weeks later, I’m still having trouble to sleep for many different reasons (and by that I mean I keep waking up too early, going to sleep is not so much a problem), and I find myself struggling without targets. But I’ve also been busy with four gigs, played football four times, ran a couple of times over 10k(gave today a miss due to having finally caught a little cold) and been to the Arsenal. Hopefully I can find a balance again, because this weekend I would have meant to be out, but found myself without the energy.
But on race day, everything had really fallen into place. Every single niggle disappeared, no pain anywhere, not the tendons, not the joints, not the muscles, not the head, I felt I gave it all but without going over the top. I lasted the distance with pace and quite frankly, even on the morning of the race, I wasn’t at all sure I could. And when you consider I am 50, had not run more than 5km at once for over 15 years last summer, had to run through a few niggles (and I weirdly registered for the race while I was still struggling with very painful back problems), it’s kind of a miracle. Guess I always had a good heart, but it needed everything to work perfectly. I mean, in September I ran 10km for the first time at 12km/h, just, but I had no idea that I could run over 21 at 12.2km/h. It’s mad. Before I first did the distance incidentally end of October (when I thought ‘hell I’ve run 15km, I’m not dead on my feet so can push to 21’), I would have thought 2h maybe 2h5 was a good target. And then I found myself at 1h54 without particularly trying and not having done it for 18 years. With the training app, I felt 1h48 would maybe be a realistic if ambitious target (the 1h54 from 18 years before became a minimum target, but as I said many times, the problem that day was terrible race management, sure physically I must have had the potential for 1h35 then, but I also didn’t know how to train), and then mid-december I found myself at 1h48 on a more difficult course and in non-ideal weather. So I moved the needle to 1h46 and decided that it would be unrealistic to target higher in race conditions. So I stuck to that. All the subsequent longer runs were too long and I didn’t get anywhere near those sort of times, but as it was all part of a training plan, I thought maybe things would still be OK. And they were. For all the reasons stated above, my ‘virtual’ coach was good, and I prepared very seriously I guess, no alcohol for three months, not missing a single session (three a week, sometimes with a little extra, and a few football sessions though I did sacrifice that in the end mostly), rain or shine, freezing or mild, all at above the prescribed speed. So to the outside eye or a trainer, my performance might not have been a surprise, but to me, it was a very good one. On the morning of the race, I was still wondering what my plans should be if I missed my target, even just the 1h46, should I try to prove myself on my own once more in the Park? But now I don’t have to. I will continue running, maybe do the odd long distance too, but just to keep fit really, with no timed target. That was a one-off, and doing it for charity was also what gave it its worth (so thanks to all who donated). Before it all, I was wondering if it was worth registering, as I could simply prove myself I could run the distance and not bother with a race, but once that was done in October (and I wanted to do it early…..snake eating its tail…to be confident of being able to do it on race day….but then the organised training plans changed it all and made it interesting), it became a non-issue. After all, between December and January, I practically did four half-marathons, including runs of 27km and 30km. So yeah, a couple of days later, on seeing all the stuff they send you about doing it again, I thought ‘OK, maybe I won’t never do it again, but if I do, it will be with someone else, and a tranquil 1h50 or 1h55, no target’. Because I don’t think I can better what I did by much. And I have no intention of becoming a serious ‘runner’. I’m grateful for my abilities, my heart and body, but I don’t see a point of running another race if I cannot improve. And that’s funny because part of the motivation was also having fucked it up 18 years before. Yet when I started I didn’t know I could do better, even with better race management. Because I am 50, not 32. And yet, it quickly became evident that I could do MUCH better.
So ultimately, yeah, I reached my target and more, which is very satisfying, but beyond the selfish accomplishment, I managed to use that to contribute to four different causes, and that’s where the value really is. There was a point when I thought, if I reach my target and die after the line, it’s great. But I need to survive another week to make the donations etc. Now that it’s done….well I still want to live, but I’m not sure what’s next. At least I won’t have completely lived in vain. I hope.
Below are many (too many!) photos from the race. Sure I paid for them and they are unequal and I had to sift through many more. So I included not just the best, but a few wider shots also to give an idea of the density of people here and there.
Sequence at km3 below: works better with the originals and scrolling through to see the movement and progress through the field. Think I’ve managed to keep them in sequence helped with a few visual clues like the zebra crossing. Different cameras were used so angles may vary. And that gallery format does not help the viewing, not sure you can isolate and zoom. Anyway, it gives you an idea, and I’m adding a few close-ups from the same area just under.
Photographers mostly lost me after…so only one at about 5km I think and just before or around 15k. Also still a bit of a pain in the arse with that autoformat of the galleries for those snaps I’m not in the middle of, I had to recut them. But if I do individual photos rather than gallery, they will be far too big and you don’t really want that.
Now nearing the end: a few snaps with 100m to go!
And now for the arrival at last! Again I have to edit due to this stupid auto-formatting getting on my tits. It’s as bad as Instagram.
A little generic video they sent. Was hoping to see more of my running but obviously it would have been hard to track, so I guess they do just a generic thing and manage to capture indiviudal arrivals only, so you can just about see me clumsily arrive shortly after 1’00.
All this for those ‘trophies’ (not really).
And now for some quite extensive data about the race. Definitely shows I’ve kept a rather steady rhythm, whether you use 1km/2.5km or 5km as a measure.
I did a better 5km in early September but then I didn’t expect to do a best 5km as part of a half-marathon so it’s not bad to do a second best I’d be curious to see if I can do better now on a specific 5km, what with being fitter than then. I might try though a few weeks later I may not be quite as fit. I’m rather impressed that I did my fastest 10k, better than in late September (when I managed a 10km at just about 12km/h then I never thought I could do a whole half-marathon even faster for sure!).
I think Strava’s definition of Zones is different as by the look of it, 5 in Garmin is 3,4 and 5 in Strava (unless Garmin oddly bases itself on the default standard rather than my own data for max HR, indeed it seems that’s what it is, that makes sense so this view is more realistic, as you’re not supposed to be Zone 5 for more than 5 min at once or something).
And now for some indirect data.
Now, obviously these are not scientific measurements, just estimations. The values may differ from a few reasons, don’t know all of them. History is one, as I only got the Forerunner before starting my official training. But I measured every ‘workout’ from the programme there, plus the few extra pure running bits. Most of the workouts included warm-up/cool down/and recovery periods of walks between heats. On the Sq, I only recorded the pure running sequences, plus a few occasional tricks (mostly failed attempts when I tried to measure only the running bits without the walking recoveries). Whichever way, while they disagree with the percentage (1% or 5%, but anyway it’s only among Garmin users I think, which is both good and bad, not representative of a whole population, but perhaps still indicative), they seem to agree my Fitness Age is 20. Which is flattering, but that’s probably a not very fit 20 y.o. Sure though, if the value is around 50 as it clearly seems to be, I am super fit (35 yo would have been fine, think it’s more my mental age anyway :-p), and I shouldn’t really doubt that anymore, and I see it when I play football. I’d like to keep fairly fit now if not quite as fit.
And finally, see for yourself, I was lucky with my best sleep before the race, wherea the week after was one of my worst in a long long time (I’m generally a shit to average sleeper at best anyway).
Epilogue : a day after posting the above data, I went for a run, aiming to beat my 5km from September as mentioned above. Note that since the half-marathon, I had played football both weeks after (Tuesday outdoors, Friday indoors), went for runs on Thursdays (first time 10km with some 800m accelerations, second time 12km, but without accelerations), had a few drinks twice, went to a few gigs, and caught a minor cold.
Weather was nice and dry, 17°. I’d pretty much recovered from my cold, was at last getting back to normal HR-wise and slightly better nights, so thought it was worth trying. Well I beat it by 50s so, happy! I started possibly a little too fast, so you can see the cadence decreases, I couldn’t hold the rhythm so faded after mostly km 3 and even more 4, but I was ahead enough. Also while I think the breathing was the limitation (I really had to make noise, don’t think I’ve ever panted that hard, pretty much continuously and very very loud from km 2.5, but I could hold OK, and at the very end accelerate without any trouble and pick up speed that was very good. Heart didn’t go very high either, so I think the limitations were truly with the lungs. Leads me to wonder once more if I’d be even more able to run fast and long if I’d never ever smoked. But anyway, that was good enough for me, and I’m not going to attempt it again. Now I do realise that, as I did my fastest 10k during the half-marathon, and that, checking online, my recent runs (HM and 5km) indicate me as very close to an ‘advanced’ runner for a 50 year old (and it actually seems to be close to agreeing with Garmin, that my times match with an ‘Intermediate’ runner of 20 (but to be fair, if you check, times for ‘intermediate’ are pretty much similar between 20 and 30), so perhaps I do have the fitness of a decent 20 year old after all, runningwise), I probably have a fair amount of margin to improve my best 10km by at least one minute. Not sure I will try though. I will just check if I beat my best at my usual old circuit (about 3.8km with more up and down that this 5k) in the next few weeks, weather permitting (because part of it is sometimes inundated), but that’s about it for timed targets. Anyway, so some data for that last fast run, illustrating what I said above (2 miles was faster, I include the per km too so you can see I faded, note that there was about 100-200m mostly downhill at the start).
And a quick look at all the records as they stand on 21/3/2024. As I said, maybe I can significantly improve the 10k, the others, only marginally at best so I won’t even try, and I know now that at the level I had, I could only beat them when meaning them. All those years of running without target, the marks established were pretty random based on mood/mental feeling etc. One of the things I’ve learnt during this training (might have mentioned it already) is that even after a bad night or not feeling completely sharp (and this has proved the case playing football even before, now that I think of it), if I am physically fit and trained, I can perform beyond my mental state. It’s just about being active about it rather than passive. From now on though, as witnessed with those 10k and 12k run the previous couple of weeks, even if I vaguely intend to run a half-marathon ‘for the sake of it’ each month if I can, I don’t really have more targets, so my running will probably be more passive. I’ll just make sure to have cardio sessions to keep fit for football and keep the ability to change and hold rhythm, which, truly is the main thing I’ve learnt about myself these past nine months or so.
Epilogue 2: 13/4/2024
I can’t remember if I mentioned it, but I had one last timed target to check/reach: beat my record on the old loop I was doing originally and for years the only run I used to do, in the park. Starts with the downhill, does the usual lap around the canal, but including the up/down hill at the far end, and back uphill at the end. The one trick was that for the run around the Octogon, I used the outer path, it’s only a slight difference from the one I adopted for longer runs, but I had to make it reproducible to enable comparisons, and the problem is that on one side it gets flooded very easily. With all the rain we’ve had lately, it was difficult to find a day when this bit should be runnable cleanly. We’ve had a few days of dry weather (just about four or five, and I did a couple of recces this week, last one on my midday run on Thursday), and I estimated that if not completely dry, it should be OK to attempt this Saturday. Ideally Sunday in fact (risk of rain on Monday/Tuesday), but as I’m off early-ish to the Arsenal, I thought it would be less stressful on the Saturday. I had one good night at last, not perfect but best in a bit, and so I set up to do it, feeling ready. In fact, one of the reasons I forced myself to keep running and practicing over the last few weeks with a fair amount of intensity was to make this attempt. I was not sure I could, because, while it was similar to doing the 5k record the other week, I hadn’t done this specific one since October, and the adding of uphills (plus one down) made it potentially harder and trickier. I set the Garmin for 1k laps again, used my old chronograph to record the intermediates. Weather was fine though a very small wind meant my hands actually suffered a bit. In an ideal situation, I would both beat the record (the target was at 17’42, I felt I could beat it ‘easily’ based on the 5k, but wasn’t entirely sure, thought I’d be happy with anything sub 17’30) and all three section times. So I set off, from a standing start, and fairly rapidly. I knew it would be tough. I’d tried to remember the intermediate to compare, so I had a first idea at the first (not ‘official’ after the downhill). 1’35. I thought it was slower than the best (thought 1’32 but on checking after it was also 1’35, so I equalled it), and felt it would be difficult to improve. But then I remembered that this mark was generally not THAT signficant. The first km came up at 4’07 which was impressive, much faster than I thought, but also dangerously fast, meaning I might have started way too fast after all. That’s the problem with short distance rather than half-marathon, I’m not sure how to manage. Anyway, the first proper intermediate came up just 4 seconds faster than the previous best, so it was all very much in the balance, and as I felt I was tiring and slowing down, I thought the possibility of beating my record was probably not happening. The uphill comes just after that, it wasn’t too easy, I definitely lost pace, and in the 15 or so metres across before the downhill, I was just recovering, but with the short downhill, I thought maybe I was feeling better and should think of picking up speed again. From there on, I wasn’t sure of anything, just my breathing becoming extremely noisy again. The 2nd kilometre came up as much slower (40s slower), but on average of the two, it was still OK to beat the record. Next intermediate would tell me more. And there it was, nearly 10s quicker than the best (from starting time), so I thought maybe, just maybe I could do this. The third kilometer came up as 4’25s which was pretty good, slightly better than the target average. I managed to keep the rhythm and focus, all that remained was to negotiate the final uphill. I did OK, didn’t feel I was forcing, just keeping strong, and for the final acceleration of another 15 or 20 metres, I actually managed to pick up a little more speed. I mean, of course, on this short run, the overall energy can’t be lacking after a decent sleep, it’s all about management. And the clock at the end displayed 17’13! So I was amazed and thrilled, because while from the second intermediate I thought beating my personal best on this course was possible, I really didn’t think I could do that by nearly 30 seconds! Mission accomplished. The later analysis showed that I did indeed beat my best on all three sections. Well, on the last one, I just equalled it, but remembering how I beat it last time, that’s even more impressive. Because that time I did the fastest third section, I had actually set out to perform only on that section. So while I hadn’t been actually slow (overall time then 18’08, and that was back mid-September), I had deliberately withheld on the first two sections to give it all on the third. Whereas this time, it was a constant high effort. The GPS on the Venu is not as good as on the Forerunner though, so you won’t see it on the pace chart (not posting it) as the data is very inaccurate. So yeah, I dipped in the middle but not in a way that it affected the intermediate, and so doing that third section as fast as in September as part of this overall effort was probably the most impressive bit there. Also at the end, Garmin estimated that my VO max was still on the up so now up to 53! Don’ t think it will or can get higher with what comes next. Anyway, so yeah, mission accomplished on all accounts and that’s me done for timed runs. Is there a little margin for improvement? Probably as I think I started a little too fast and didn’t manage the middle so well. But I think that’s pretty much it for timed targets for me now. If there was any doubt that the long-distance training helped me performed better over short distances too, the proof has been made twice, and that’s now over a month since the half-marathon. Sure I’ve deliberately aimed to keep going and tried not to relax on fitness (I might take it easier now though), but my series of 800m were not as good as when training recently (but again, no target meant it was different), and for instance my run on Thursday felt a bit of a struggle at times. But for today, I was in the right frame. Oh yes, I mentioned the crucial flooded bit earlier. Well, it still wasn’t dry and there was a signficant puddle, so I got sideways for a step or two and had to splash into the mud just once, but it didn’t cost me anything at all, maybe one or two tenths of a second at worst, so good decision to go this morning! Now I can relax, go back to longer distance at leisurely-ish pace, and yeah, maybe I’ll try the marathon distance within the next few months, but if I do, purely just to check it, I’m still not going to do an official marathon. We’ll see anyway, don’t want to put pressure on myself for this, 21km occasionally is enough, I think! Off to the Arsenal with friends tomorrow for merriment and drinks, that certainly won’t be a day for fitness!
