As I'm sure many people were taking in the festivities of the Ottawa Race Marathon downtown today. I was lacing up my sneakers to tackle my long run of the week.
Todays Stats: 6miles, 9.68km in 57:17, avg pace 5:55/km burned 879 cal, I felt really good today. Just went at it as if it was second nature. I was born to run, lovin' every minute of it.
I find it interesting to look at my split time as I usually only run the first 5km in 30mins and seem to make up time on the back half. I do get slow starts in the morning and don't really get loosened up till well into the first mile. That raises the question of how much do I need to warm up before this marathon. Do running do a 1/2 mile warm up before starting the race? I wonder what the ideal is. I know my muscles are pretty cold, stiff and tight at the beginning of my run. And also protecting my muscles from the cold. I remember back in 2004 at the beginning of the PEI marathon way out by the water, the wind and cool air would be just enough to freeze you up before a race. I'll have to plan wardrobe stations just keep be fit before, during and after the race. Or am I looking into this to much?
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Hi Laura, well as you are not an elite Marathoner, you certainly don't have to worry about warming up for a marathon race. In fact as your race is at the end of October and in P.E.I., where it can get quite windy, you would be better served to keep as warm as possible and only go out to the starting line just before the race begins.
ReplyDeleteAs far as warming up your muscles for the race itself, believe me when I say using that first 5 km. in the race to warm up would be an excellent idea, as this will prevent you from going out too fast.
Congratulations on your tempo run this morning @ 57 min. Do you remember the 10 km. race you did with me the night before my Ottawa Marathon? You finished that in almost exactly an hour. Therefore, with this better training you are doing I predict that in another 10 km., right now, I predict that you could do a 10 km. in about 50 minutes flat. Wow, what an inprovement! We will see??? Plan for your next 10 km. in the next 3 weeks. How do you like that for a challenge? Your ready! Good luck.
As you know my Cabot Trail Relay is done for this year. This was my 16th. consecutive Cabot Trail Race. Wow, how time flys. It worked out that I had to run 2 Legs as we were short runners in our team. My first Leg # 2 was 17.92 km. @ 8:30 a.m. @ only an elevation of 60 meters. There are 17 runners in each team and 70 teams. Therefore you are competing against 69 other runners in each Leg. My time was 1 hr. 33 min. which made me a 40th. place finish. I was reasonably happy with that, considering the shape I was in.
My next Leg # 11, was 13 hours later @ 11:00 p.m. the same day. This was obviously a night run (pitch dark), you couldn't even see the pavement under your feet. It was @ an elevation of 460 meters with a very cold start. The first 5.8 km. climbs steady and then you get to coast down hill for the next 5 km. and then you get to climb for the last 3 km. to the finish line. You are so tired that it is the only time I remember going through the finish shut in slow motion. I finished it in 1 hr. 16 min.
All-in-all, Laura, it was a great weekend and we had a lot of laughs, not to mention, I got to eat 2 lobsters, one for each Leg I ran. We finished the banquet and was on our way home by 3:00 p.m., just missing the rain storm that started 2 minutes after we started driving on Sunday and has not stopped yet. Now I hear it is going to rain until next Thurssay. Anyway, Honey, my sore muscles are all better and now I can plan for my next race. Talk to you tomorow. Cheers, Dad