I had made a rough raceplan after seeing the course in my attempt to break 77minutes, which I felt was an ambitious but achievable target. This plan entailed getting to 6 miles in 36minutes (6min/mile pace)and running 5.45's for the the remaining 7 & a bit miles. In the back of my mind the 5.45's were a bit worrying so I was thinking maybe a tad under 36minutes would be needed.
The first few miles were fairly undulating and I felt reasonably comfortable doing 5.45s. I was in a group of 5 or 6 and we shared the lead with about 12 runners in a line ahead of us. This group was whittled down to 4 by the start of the hill & at this point I let the other guys go as I wanted to go up the hill at my own pace. By the top two of the lads came back to me and we caught another guy on the downhill. The downhill was murder on the quads but I was relieved to see a split time of 5.40 at the 7 mile mark. From here on for the next few miles was a gradual down hill and I was delighted to see my splits were hitting 5.30's. At this stage I knew I was on for a pretty good time as long as I could hold it together. I managed to do just that and even passed 3 or 4 people who had obviously put in too much effort over the hill. I took on some energy drink at around mile 10 & forced down half a cereal bar (and I really mean forced - it took me three full miles to eat it - sustained energy release or what!) I didn't want to repeat the fading off that had occured in Qatar.
I crossed the line in 76.10 knackered but delighted!!
Warmup:1.78 Race13.1miles 10th 76.10(5.40,5.43,5.44,5.46,6.06,6.24,5.40,5.30,5.35,5.39,5.45,5.45,5.43,1.06)Warmdown:1mile
Knee was a bit sore on monday so just did 50 minutes easy. Had planned on doing a session of 1000's yesterday but after the first one taking 3.32 I had to admit to myself that Sunday had taken more out of me so only did 3.
Will take it easy again this evening and try and do some quality work tomorrow.
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