Penninsula 5k Race

A couple of weeks since I posted

Week 1 103k@4:34

Tuesday night 6x800m intervals on the track 2:43/2:39/2:41/2:41/2:39/2:32 - jog recovery for half, standing for half. I ran these in the Saucony Hattori (barefoot type shoe) which felt very fast, but left me with very sore calves for the next 3 days

Sunday am 32k@4:40 with Clown - ran on the flat 'round the river which felt easy - reminds me how undulating my usual runs are.

Week 2 94k@4:29

Tuesday pm Mona interval (20min) on the track - 5.56k on the track (Garmin read 5.86!) - new Mona PB for me, and still felt controlled. Again ran in the Hattori and again took the rest of the week for the calves to recover - think I'll persevere and hope this improves

Sun am Penninsula 5k Race 17:26

Didn't really taper for this - ran 15k tour de Bold Park loop on Sat am.

Arrived at 6:15 and did 7k warmup with a few strides at the end
The 10k went off 5 min before the 5k, and most of the good runners (Roberto, Chris O'Neill and Stephen Stockwell) were in that, leaving a fairly small 5k field, even though the 5k was the club championship race.

I tried to squeeze in the front line at the start amongst the kids who invariably seem to fill it, and ended up starting just behind Tommy Lovekin, who'd run 33min at John Gilmour.

Started out fairly fast to ase the congestion and by 1k I'd settled in to 3rd place. Tommy was way out ahead (he stopped to do up his lace at 1k and still was ahead once he got up - must have done 3 flat) then a guy who seemed to be running comfortably in second - I later found out was Matt Di Masi - who won the B race at John Gilmour in 35:xx.

I was feeling pretty good, 3:22 then 3:40 slower prob with the turns onto the bridge. There was a reasoable easterly blowing so I was keen to push early on knowing there'd be a headwind 2.5-3.5k.

The race was well set up motivation wise - Matt was 30m ahead of me coming to halfway so I had someone to focus on, and unusually for me I never thought about someone behind me catching up - I was focussed on second.

Halfway hairpin in 8:50 - although I didn't look at my watch once during the race. Running back into the wind I focussed on holding ground on second, planning on a final km acceleration.

3:26/3:30 kms 3 and 4.

I accelerated down the hill off the bridge and strated to make some ground on Matt - passing him and trying hard to make the pass stick (something I thought about after B'Man passed me last race - need to keep going by the person you pass). Tommy had obviously blown himself up a bit with the fast start, and was only about 10 sec in front of me and looking behind. I was no chance of catching him but it made me feel good about my finish. Final k 3:20 (plus a little extra on Garmin)

Felt really happy with the result - my first podium in a non-handicap WAMC race. Went for an easy 5.5k cooldown before collecting my medal (!)

Met Dan Macey afterwards who, despite training with Big Kev at times, is a very nice guy. He's doing some Friday night track races this summer and the discussion reconfirmed my desire to do a track 3k and 1500m in the next couple of months to round out some PBs.

John Gilmour Track 10000m

36:34 - pretty much a par effort on predictions. PB offically by a minute, although I've run the first 10k of city to surf(12k) and Run4aReason(14k) in sub37 this year

I had a little scare at 4am Friday when I was woken by a calf cramp. I'm lucky in that this is only the second true cramp I've ever had, but boy are they painful. After the minute or two of stomach-turning pain, the upper calf was sore all day. Luckily this didn't affect me at all whilst I was running. It was pretty sore afterards though.

Had a 3k warmup with B'Man then did 2 laps with a run through down the back straight. My legs felt flat so I stopped it there.

The field was pretty impressive, and almost immediately 2 separate packs formed - the first dozen then a gap to my pack which I was near the front of. Unfortunately the guy in front of me pushed the straights then propped on the bends, a pattern which continued for about the first 4km. I ended up running wide quite a bit. Luckily when the main pack passed us he tried to go with them, burnt out, and fell back behind me.

I started 82/85/84/85/86/88/88/88 (3k in 10:38) and maintained 88s til halfway in 17:58 - just where I planned to be.
From 5-8k I slipped to 90 sec lap averages, slowest 91, and was a bit in no mans land as I waited for B'man to catch me. I didn't feel too bad, never felt like I wouldn't finish it off, and I suspect if he caught me earlier I might have run a few seconds faster.

B'man caught me bang on 8k, and immediately took a 10m gap, which I was able to hold for 4 laps. I thought I might have a shot in the last lap, but he took off hard and got out to 30m, and I didn't narrow that (last 2 laps 87/83)

Pleasingly I felt pretty good afterwards, but think I ran pretty close to my current potential.
As per last year it was interesting to see how fast Roberto Busi runs (he won easily despite stopping to tie his shoes) and impressed again by Cody's effortless style in second - he even offered a word of encouragement as he passed me - the best I could do was raise a hand in thanks.

So that's my first PB of this spring/summer - think I'll do the 5k at Penninsula Run in a fortnight to break a soft/old 5k PB (I think my official 5k PB is 18:57 from a couple of years ago!)