This race was on September 4 and since then I've come down with a touch
of the dreaded 'man flu' — totally annoying, as illness and
injury are the two things to be avoided when building a base of fitness.
I planned to 'run through' this race (no taper and minimal recovery)
and it completed my biggest week of training this year, at a fairly
modest 61 kilometres.
I took a rest day on the Saturday and lined up on Sunday with the goal
of starting at around 5-minute kilometre pace. The plan commenced well
although the 50-minute pacers gradually disappeared ahead (moving too
fast it seems as my first splits were 4:56, 4:52 and 5:04 on the fastest
section of the course). As I ran up the gentle hill at 4k I sensed I
was catching my lifelong rival Jimmy and chipped away his 50 metre lead
until we were level at 5k. The split there was 25:32 at the high point
of the course. The Canberra Times is definitely a race for negative
splitting experts like Mark Watson. Unfortunately on this day I pulled
out a big fat positive split!
Jimmy flew past down the hill at 6k but I limited the damage by holding
the gap to 30 metres or so as we turned onto Kings Avenue. My race was
totally focussed on my rival, not on time. I placed a few runners
between us so I'd be out of view if he took a look back. It worked! He
seemed surprised when I ran up beside him on the bridge. Less than 2k to
go, so I forged ahead, running as quickly as possible to the finish.
52:01 for myself and 52:33 for Jimmy so I'll count that as my first
'win' since March. Looking forward to more of the same once I'm over
this annoying cold, ah, I mean flu!
I've been breaking in a pair of new Saucony Kinvaras from The Runner's Shop - nice light shoes!
