I finished work at 9:30pm on Saturday night. I headed straight home and put my feet up. Lights out, with compression socks on, at 11.15pm. Alarm set for 8am. Race start at 10am.
BUPA 10,000 25.5.14
08:00
I woke up refreshed and surprisingly my legs felt good! The sun was shining in through my window whilst I chose my outfit for the run. Then the clouds rolled in and I was doubtful it would be a dry run. To be on the safe side, I chucked on a pair of lululemon run inspire crops, a Nike running t shirt and my adidas (bright orange) run jacket. All this was teamed with my Adidas Energy Boost II trainers – my favourite running shoes since they graced my feet earlier this year.
I had a small bowl of granola with almond milk for breakfast which came in my finishers bag the day before. I grabbed a banana, carton of chocolate coconut milk and some belvita biscuits for the journey…
09:10
A short bus ride to the tube station and a ten minute tube ride and I was at Green Park.
09:40
Out the station and straight into the race village. I heard an announcement saying the yellow wave had plenty of time…we would probably be setting off about 10:30am so I has time to chill, soak up some atmosphere and sunshine! I also ate my banana, drank a bit more of the milk and stashed my biscuits in my waist belt for post race.
10:00
Time to make my way to the start line along with the hundreds, thousands of other runners in my wave. The very same start line as the day before.
10:30
3…2…1…GO! We started somewhere around the 10:30am mark! I was of course busy setting up my Nike+ to record my run. This was also the point where I set my intention for the run. I decided to run hard. No pictures, no chilling…just enjoy the run, stay positive, keep running and see what I could pull out of the bag.
With feedback from Nike+ every 0.5km, the first update told me I was running under 6 minutes per km. At first I wasn’t too happy then I remembered this pace would bring me in under an hour. I was happy (and only 5% into the distance though). I carried on none the less and seemed to be in my stride already – the mile the day before seemed to have counted towards this!
At the 3km water station, I saw a girl running a place I liked so I decided to stick behind her and not let her get away from me. Having something, or someone to focus on seemed to do the trick. Until we got to the point that I decided I was selling myself short and could, possibly, run a little faster. I think I overtook her at the 5km mark and never saw her again.
The sun was out in force with short areas of shade. The route was similar to the British 10km which I ran a couple of years ago in the most unbearable heat. At the right time, there was a station of cool water mist, then the water station just before 7km. The course was a mostly flat course – just a couple of hills – which I utilised to run as fast as possible downhill.
By this point, my legs were a little heavy but I only had 3km to go with a pace that would definitely bring me in under an hour. At the 8km I heard someone shout my name – Venetia. She put a smile on my face and a spring in my step. I was missing the encouragement from Nike+ cheers as it wouldn’t connect to Facebook.
1km to go. 800m to go…this was familiar. The same final straight as the Westminster Mile felt a little like home. I stopped momentarily to walk at this point and realised that walking was more more uncomfortable than running so I got straight back to running. I started to day dream and slow down as I approached the finish line then gave myself a mind push and sprinted (erm, maybe!) to the finish line!
11:30
…somewhere around this time. This time the finish was a lot busier. It took longer than the day before to get our timing chips removed but nothing to complain about. I grabbed my finishers bag with small tshirt and headed to the exit. Again, I didn’t have a bag to collect so I headed straight for the tube station after a stop by the adidas tent to tell them how much I loved running in my shoes!
My time?!
Officially… 57:48 …which is a Personal Best! Beating my time of 58:18 at the Energizer Night Run in April of 2013!
My Nike+ time?!
Well, that was a PB in itself too! 55:02 (which then got changed to 55:14 when my run was deleted and manually added again on Nike+). My Nike+ running app recorded the distance at 10.5km rather than 10km and I wasn’t the only one this happened to.
For me, which ever result is accurate means a PB for me so I cannot help but be happy! I trained 3 months solid for my 2013 PB and this shows me that I can still run a PB without dedicating all my training to running. I must be doing something right; maybe I can run, and have it all!
Here are some pretty interesting stats from the run by RunPix:
12:15
Refuelling with my leftover belvita biscuits and every other morsel of food in sight…I headed home, with my legs still feeling decent and feeling pleased with my effort! Overall, it was a little lonely running by myself but it was what I needed to be able to push outside of my comfort zone.
The race was as anticipated…well organised, beautiful route and another stunning medal to add to my 2014 collection…to the weekend’s collection!
Thanks again to Beki (of Miss Wheezy blog) for hooking me up with the place to run! Thanks to everyone that would’ve cheered for me had my run synced with Facebook! No pictures, but full of victory!
Elle
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