Sometimes the sanity of runners can be called into question. Why would someone who worked until 3am then get up at 7am, leave a comfy hotel room and go running with a bunch of strangers on the other side of London?
One good reason to leave the hotel was to escape the Ashes coverage. It seems the trend for old school has made it to cricket & the England team are doing their best 1990's impression! The other reason is to try and shake off my cold / illness, it's been a week already & I'm bored of it! As I checked out of the hotel just before eight I realised I'd need everything to go in my favour just to get to the event in time. I'd failed to grasp that Valentines parkrun was an hour away from where I was staying. Luckily the tubes ran perfectly and after a gentle jog to the start I found myself at the event with plenty of time.
I even bumped into some friendly faces which allowed me to not be a parkrun loner for once!
The Run
Excuses on the table before we start.
1 - Lack of sleep. Working until stupid o'clock meant very little sleep yesterday. Two blocks of short sleep is nothing like a decent night.
2 - Illness. I'm a coughing, spluttering & sneezing mess right now. A pre race dose of Lemsip was required just to make myself passable.
3 - Lack of Breakfast. Poor preparation on my part, hadn't picked up a banana or something to eat yesterday. So this left me running on fumes.
With all this in mind I just wanted to finish. No expectations today, just get round & get home. There was a 24:00 pacer, but I realised shortly after the slightly farcical start that trying to stick with him would be suicidal. My pace for the first couple of km appeared to be around the 5:00/km mark. Being another new event I had no idea whether the course would measure short or long. One benefit of being a two lapper was seeing myself come through the first lap in sub 25 pace and knowing that it was just about finishing.
I can't say I particularly enjoyed the run. I struggled for rhythm at times and felt low in terms of energy. I could feel my pace deteriorating in the 2nd half but didn't fight it too much. At one point I kept kicking my own heels, a sure sign thaty stride wasn't great today. As the finish line approached I could hear someone behind me trying to overtake so pride kicked in and I gave it a last 100m push.
Once the race was over I was free to continue coughing away, one chap asked if I was ok, especially as running is meant to be good for you!
Overall a 24:37 is a time that I'd have bitten your hand off for 6 months ago. Today it felt so so. A mark of my improvement perhaps that I can have a bad day and still return a sub 25:00. The course is near perfect. A slightly narrow start means you need to bide your time. Other than that it is flat tarmac, definite PB potential.
The Eat
A slice of millionaires shortbread from the excellent Knead Food in Stortford was my reward for the effort. Missed out on one of their epic sausage rolls though, too late in the day. If only Bishops Stortford had a parkrun!
The Conclusion
Feeling good about the last week of this training cycle and the 10k on Saturday. Seven parkrun events in 10 weeks, unheard of for me and I've enjoyed seeing my pace return. If I can shake the cold who knows what I'm capable of next week.
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