Central Coast Half - A Miner Train Smash

21.1K in far too long.

Settle in. It's a long one today.

Firstly, let me apologise for that apalling pun in the title.

It's no secret I was looking forward to today's race. There were a few reasons for this: a flat half for a potential quick time, a number of Coolrunners all shooting for the same target, the post race gathering and an answer to the question of whether I can run 1:50 for a half marathon.

The answer today was no.

I got up to my folks place at Copacabana on Saturday afternoon and had a good, relaxed and early night. I slept well for me, but I was awake by 3:30 when my phone that I was using as an alarm received a very welcome good luck message from the other side of the planet. I had a small breakfast. Usually I don’t eat pre training, but usually I get out of bed and go, so I needed the energy to get me to the start line.

I met up with the other members of the Miner train pre-race, meeting Miners, Kazz and 2P for the first time.

The start caught us all by surprise. We took off and ran the first K in about 5:20 due to congestion.

After this the Miner train settled in to a good pace at 5:08 or so. Plu was chatting incessantly, recording podcasts and the mood was good. By 3K I was breathing pretty heavily, and I sort of suspected that I wouldn’t be able to keep it up. By 6K I knew it, and as the train was splintering slightly I mentioned to Miner that I’d have to slow down. He suggested I slow down for a while and see how I felt, but after 2 slower K’s I knew I was done for and told Miner as much as he dropped back to check on me. Almost on cue I vomited as if my body was keen to prove it’s point.

At this point I’ll make special thanks to Miners. He was an awesome pacer today. For the time I ran with the train he kept an eye on everyone, and was encouraging and supporting. Well done and thank you.

From then on the race became an ugly training run. I ran/shuffled until about 12K, when the urge to walk got the better of me. From then one I took a few walk breaks with increasing frequency. I managed to run about half a K with Kazz, who was on her way to a PB, but eventually she pulled away, and I shuffled on to about 19K where I met with the retreating cheer squad of Jen_stretches and Go Husband.

This presented the perfect opportunity to walk it in, so I did. I was feeling a bit light headed at this point, so I was glad of the company and change in pace.

About 500m from the finish we were passed by an old bloke who was shuffling, and looked to be struggling a bit. We cheered him on in true cheer squad style, and he looked to really appreciate this, so I said “Come on mate, I’ll run you in.”

It was his first (and he says last) half, and his one target was to run the whole thing without walking. I thought back to my first half in 2003– same aim, about the same time and same result (success!). As we hit the last hundred metres, he was able to share in the cheers of the many gathered Coolrunners who were encouraging me home, and you could tell how chuffed he was as we passed the finish line. I shook his hand and congratulated him, and he thanked me and said that he couldn’t have done it without me. While this was bullshit, it was a nice thing to say, and he certainly made the race a positive experience.

Post race I caught up with a bunch of people, most of whom had run well, and settled in for the presentations – which were the sort of confused mess that you can expect at a small race, crowned by the misengraving of all of the half marathon trophies. After this they had run out of time for the lucky dips, so they just had a scab grab for most of them. I didn't need any $2.00 stuff from Golo, so I gave it a miss.

A quick swim at the beach (mainly to rid myself of post race stench), and it was off to the Entrance Hotel for my usual post race feast of carbohydrates, fat and caffeine. This was the typically enjoyable post race gathering of Coolrunners – the perfect way to round off a race.

So now it’s ten hours after the race finished. This may sound a bit strange, but I’m not disappointed. Sure, I’ve trained my arse off with this race in mind for three months, but I’ve accepted that right at the moment I am not capable of 1:50 for a half. Zen Ben, I guess.

Post mortem time – why did I crash? I suspect the main factors were: insufficient recovery from illness, somewhat erratic training and possibly too much cross training.

To address the first problem, I’m taking a break from hard training. For at least a fortnight, and probably four weeks I will cut back to four or five low intensity sessions a week. No speedwork and no long runs. I think my body needs it. It’s been a big year for running, health (both mental and physical), work and emotionally. A bit of downtime will do me good.

When I do get back into it I will pick some target races and frame a detailed program around them. This may include other races as speedwork, but not as excuses to soften the program.

When I frame this program I will decide if I can afford to still ride and swim every week. One thing I have decided since moving away from the Hawkesbury Triathlon Club is that I am not a triathlete who does a lot of running, I am a runner who owns a bike and a pair of budgie smugglers. It’s about time I started acting like it. This does not mean that I won’t take up triathlon in the future or that I won’t enter one in the coming year. It just means that for now, my focus will be the glorious sport of long distance running.

I had been having thoughts that my next race might be the Canberra Marathon. I even said it out loud a couple of times. It won’t be. My body needs a break, and then I will ease back into it. I think I need a 1:50 under my belt before I attack my next target – a four hour marathon. I have another vague target in mind after that, but I definitely need the four hour marathon before that, and it involves a world of pain that I don’t know if I can handle, so I’m not sure about it.

(Did I really just blog that – I must be delirious)

If you are still reading, thank you very much. You can go to bed now.