Wokingham Half Marathon

Back at the start of 2011 I realised that I had somehow descended to a new low in terms of my fitness. This was brought home by an attempt at the Turbo marathon in December which was interspersed with a holiday and the general gluttony of December. Anyway, I decided to do something about it and try and get some level of fitness back before the season started to get going. So, the whole of January has seen me training quite consistently, only really averaging about 10 hours a week, but that seems a lot these days, what with work etc.

I had done a fair bit of running during January, typically doing 3-4 sessions a week and combining some long runs, tempo runs and I had even been back on the treadmill in the gym. I could feel that things were starting to come back after a couple of weeks. My heart rate had lowered a bit and the scales were moving the right direction as well.

For Wokingham, my main aim was to see if I could hold 4min/km's for the race. This would give me a 1:24, which although off the PB by a bit, would be a respectable time given the circumstances. Come race day, there was a bit of a wind which someone reliably informed me would mean a headwind for miles 10-12 - not good.

I set off okay and I was going through the mile markers consistently, initially gaining some time on the virtual partner, but slowly losing some once I had gone through 6 miles. Still, I was 1:20 up on the partner at about mile 9 and that was when the headwind kicked in. I really struggled in those two miles, especially as they also contain the only two significant hills on the course.

Crossed the line in what I thought was 1:24:13 but found out later that the actual results have me down for 1:24:01. So, all in all, not a bad day. I stuck to the game plan and I actually did not feel as bad as I normally do in the last few miles.

I have Tunbridge Wells half marathon in two weeks now. Bit more of a hilly affair there.