Turning back the feet of time

In 30 degree Celsius temperatures you have to alter your speed and go by feel, much like during the winter when the freeze made running at a regular pace difficult. About a month ago I was laughing at all the Kenyans who were competing in the Stockholm marathon, and firm favourites to win the race, had to drop out with only 10 km to go because the conditions were too cold for them...This lead to a Swede finishing 5th, which is unheard of these days in international marathoning, and curiously enough, an Ethiopian winning the race (how do you explain that?). Well, let's just say as of late the Kenyans would have been laughing at me, but I'm about to put an end to that! This week has been a step in the right direction towards acclimatizing to the summer heat with finally some consistent running, and that feels good I have to say. On Saturday, I run 13.5 miles in the heat with focus on not running too fast. I kept to the shade when possible and managed to keep it at a around 7:30/mile pace. Then on Monday, I ran about 6 miles with Anais, and the next day I wanted to run 5 miles at tempo pace. I went by effort and found 6:20 pace to be reasonable. For some reason I'm quite good at consistently holding essentially the same pace mile after mile and I ran almost even 6:20 miles for the duration of the run, albeit I had to push a bit extra towards the end. The 1.5 mile cool-down was nearly pedestrian, evidence I had to dig deep, but it was so satisfying to complete the run as  planned! The next day I ran just over 10 km in my new Saucony A5 and, in spite of the heat, I managed to find an almost effortless stride at around 6:45 pace, which was very satisfying. So now I'm back!

Moving forward, the main goal will be September's half marathon, but there will be a few other highlights along the way and after for sure. For example, next up in mid-July is the 10 miler at the Experimental farm. Previously, I mentioned my last race was a disappointment, but really I've been putting ridiculously high expectations on myself. I've only been running for just over a year and I can only improve, while many of the runners I've been competing with have been running for years. We're going on holiday next week, and although we plan on doing some running it won't be a priority. Nonetheless, I will be fired up and ready to compete for the 10 miler as I think it may be my optimal distance. Last year, I finished 4th and it seemed everyone got a prize but me (as top 3 runners and age group winners received prizes), and as you know I'd love to bring home some premium shoe deodorizer or wrist sweat band, I'll be running my best...

Everyone's a winner! Alterna Ultimate run for men's cancer raised over 400,000 dollars :)

Speaking of prizes, I picked up my age-group trophy from the Alterna Ultimate 10k the other day. They couldn't hand them out on race day because, apparently, there had been some kind of mix up with one of the age group winners. Had Ben Johnson competed in the over 50s division, I wondered? So, I went to pick up my 2nd place trophy last week at the cancer institute, but to my surprise they didn't have me on the list! Had I failed the doping test? No, not this time. They were simply looking for me on the wrong list (no, not the women's list, but because of my "unusual" name that's happened before...). I was registered in the 19-29 age category, and as it turned out I finished 1st..yeah! I tried to protest, but to no avail. As a matter of fact, Anais registered me for the race, so obviously she doesn't know how old I am.. best keep it a secret for now..