National Rd Relays

National Rd Relays 09

After some hard weeks training I was looking forward to using these relays as a bit of a blow out. I was aiming for a sub 14 min run on the short leg. This I would have been happy with.

On arrival at the race I met up with a few friends and before long everyone knew everyone else’s stages that they were running. Nothing unusual there. Stage 2 (which I was on) was stacked. I was happy as I had spoken to our team manager before hand and he had put one of our weaker runners on the first stage so there were going to be a lot of people ‘lined up’ for me to chase, for which I was very grateful.

I wanted to run strong on the initial hill and controlled, not flat out so that I had a lot left to pull on the drag up to the ice cream van at the turn around. After that it was down the hill, around the pond on the off road loop and then all out to the finish.

The plan was going well and I was feeling strong off the top of the hill. I knew I was running fast and moving well along the uphill drag to the turn around as I could see I was catching a training partner of mine and I knew he wouldn’t have been running slowly!!

After the turn around I opened up down the hill and ‘let go’. I was still moving well and the bottom of the hill came a lot quicker than I had expected. I swung left onto the off road/gravel section of the course and ran really wide, before I could react I was down on my arse!! I couldn’t believe it!! I had fallen over...

I got up as quick as possible and got back into my running straight away. After a fall the first 20-30 seconds you don’t feel too bad but that’s because the adrenaline had kicked in. After it wears off its tuff. At the hardest point of the race, the last quarter, I was knocked completely out of my rhythm and was struggling for breath. I think I was a little winded.

So I tried to work it hard back into the finish but I’d lost it. At this point all my thoughts were for the team!

After all I ended up 5^th quickest of the day. 16 second off the quickest (although someone who timed me from start to finish had me three seconds quicker??! (But that’s another discussion)

Initially I was disappointed with the run. Being 13 second outside my target time and making a stupid mistake, falling over, what a school boy error. I’d probably lost 15-20 seconds with the fall etc but that’s not the point. Everyone can say ‘I could do this’ or ‘I should have done this’ but I didn’t. I can accept that it’s not a true representation of what I could run around that course but it’s just unquantifiable now. All I can take from it is that I felt good and strong and I’m not injured from the fall.

Looking forward to my next race..

Drapes