Sunday Sept. 13th was shaping up to be one of the weekends that I would make my most significant gain, aiming for a target between 1hr 30 and 1hr 35 I was to achieve a new personal best, and was reasonably sure that I would get within 5 mins of this time at least, however this weekend it was not to be....
This weekend I learnt a difficult lesson: that the race doesn’t always need to be run in first place (or in my case beating my personal best) to be successful, it’s taken me a few days to figure this out hence the delay in the Blog.
I looked at the definition of Challenge: "A test of one's abilities or resources in a demanding but stimulating undertaking"
Than I looked at the definition of Successful: "Having a favourable outcome", "Having obtained something desired or intended"
I have met both of these this weekend, when this challenge started I had no aspirations of anything more than finishing the 21km and my main "desired" goal for running and in life is to: never give up!.
This weekend I finished and I never gave up, a successful weekend of some sorts, but perhaps not the one I set out to achieve, the icing and celebration factor for me is to beat the PB, so after only running 5 half marathons in roughly 2 and a half months ever in my life, I think I’m doing pretty well.
The time this week was my slowest ever compared to the other 5 Half’s I’ve run, 1hr 53m 54s, placing Div. 363, Overall, 2553 out of 20,000 runners.
I started out in the qualified group B, so basically I was up the front amongst the starting 100 odd people, and no one to get in my way as I set out hard, this should have been a significant advantage.
The Journey started with many good wishes, and people eager for me to smash my targets on this challenge.
I met a couple of really nice other runners early morning in the Hotel Lobby and we shared a cab down to the start line..... it was great to connect with like minded people.
I set out relatively confident, achieved a 6m 45s first mile and on the iPod started with the song "from a land down under", than things started to go wrong, just after mile 1, nature called and I had to make a b-line for the woods and outta view to help the local trees grow, now I've read about others having to do this but never thought I'd actually be one doing it.... I even went before the start so a good 30-45s wasted here..... I started out again, the 2nd mile clicked in at about 7m 30s, and I was already feeling something, the heat around 26 degrees or the fact that I simply wasn’t keeping a sub - 7min mile might have done it, in any case by mile 5 I was 38:56 or 7.8m miles, the next 5 seen me blow out to 8.9m miles (what tha!) and I finished with an overall avg of 8.4m miles :(
After being extremely sore and feeling beat I headed back to the hotel and managed to shower and sleep for a bit, in the afternoon caught up with a friend for a few hours which was great, My mother who made the trip with me on this occasion couldn’t make it down to the finish line, but was a very welcoming on my return even with my bad mood.
Monday night after getting out and enjoying the city, I caught up with another good Friend, David: Who knew that David enjoyed running??? and I think a lot better at it than he shared with me on this night after my battered time Sunday, but we managed to have a similar passion for running, and after a while I seen how little I know about the preparation, science and thought that needs to go into it, I think I’ve just been lucky (run a heap of miles and go run a half marathon: hope for the best) in any case - I have to get a couple of David’s prep. plans, and I’ve bought one of those neat GPS watch things by Garmin that let you track your speed, miles, targets, and download the whole thing to Google maps after the event and see what the heck your doing right and wrong....
David’s a wealth of information and a great guy, I am keen to follow his 2009 Chicago Full Bank of America Marathon Attempt (I wouldn’t be surprised if he qualifies for Boston!)
In any case I’m going to be back in Chicago in 2010 for the Bank of America Full Marathon and will be sure to gain back some of the time that I lost this weekend.
I am now pearing for the Sydney Harbour Half Marathon coming up this weekend, I dont have high expectations considering this weekends times, BUT I will 1. Never Give Up, and 2. Finish!
What I am really proud of this weekend is that I commited that my next challenge would go to a cause called LArche and as such the finish line donation goes to them:
Every L’Arche community offers people with an intellectual disability a family-style living environment that encourages them to create a home, to develop their talents, to build friendships and quite simply, to make the most of life!
Watch for the next Run....
Cheers
Jeff
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