I went out hard. Too hard. But it felt so good. I was sitting on Paul's shoulder, holding 5:30/mile. We were a few meters back of Jay and another strong runner, Ian Druce. I was pretty impressed that I was there as usually these guys are a pack ahead of me. That should have been my first clue.
Rookie mistake. The course was marked in miles, not kms. I am not used to mile splits (although I better get used to them for Boston). If I had seen that I was running 3:25/km, maybe I would have eased off a little. But then again, maybe not.
We went through the first 4 miles and we were holding pace, although it felt to me as though we were picking it up. That should have been my second clue. I fell off pace a couple of times, but I worked myself back onto Paul's shoulder, not wanting to lose the group. We were on the seawall and I knew it would be better to be in a group in case there was wind. But I finally saw a gap open up just before 6 miles. By the halfway point, they had 15 seconds on me. 36:21 was my split, which would be a 1:12:42 finishing time - a PB by 3 minutes. That was my last clue.
It was a bit of suffering from that point on. I tried desperately to hold onto 6:oo/miles, sometimes more successfully than others. I got passed by about 4 people. I felt plodding and tried to focus on smiling and keeping my turnover up.
I came through the finish in a disappointing PB of 1:15:38 for 19th place (10 seconds faster than the Royal Victoria Half-Marathon in 2006 - 1:15:48). I did not race smartly. I did not race within myself, going out with guys who I can run with in workouts, but who race faster than me. Paul and Jay had great races, which is awesome. I feel as though if I had been smarter I could have run 1:14:30, but I ran 1:15:38 so that is the new standard.
This is all training for Boston. I also have to keep in mind that I have set two PBs in my last two races and in neither of them did I feel great. That is the good sign. I found my humility in this race and will focus on myself, not those around me, from here on out. At the 8k, at the marathon last fall, and here today I have been looking for HUGE PBs, thus small ones seem to be less special to me. But no longer - I am now focussing on a strong race and I will let the PBs fall where they may.
Thanks to the boys for talking me through this one.
5 comments:
A Pb's a PB, you draw from every race. First thing you taught me, run your own race nobody else's. Well run Brad, keep the kid inside alive. RR
You should be proud of yourself, and PB is a PB and a lesson learned, well, all the best in remembering.
Well done for going out and trying!
I agree with Michael Brad PB is PB, and you worked hard for it.
Well done!
Hicham
Ah, I miss the Victoria crew. Thanks for the words and perspective. I am feeling better about it. My Dad has said that I seem to be beating myself up a little on the blog of late, and I think that is because of the promise that workouts are showing is not being exhibited in races. However, I have not been running smart races either. All in all, I am pleased with where I am at and determined to get a "smart" race in soon.
Thanks again for the support!
(and it is nice knowing that people are out there reading!)
You will run your best race when you leave your ego at the start and just run hard ie:go for it! Take on the whatever happens attitude and you will be surprised. Leave the splits,heart rate,stopwatch, technical cadence crap alone and just run .Runners are always making excuses for their performance and I have heard alot. Just realize some days are good and some okay and one day a good day will be on race day.Mental attitude on game day makes up more than we realize.Tip on Boston??Train downhill as I ran it 3 years ago and was zooming past 10km in 37minutes and ended up finishing over 3 hours because of the downhills quads were killing.
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