Friday, April 20, 2012

Two posts in two days?

For those that don't know, I'm a bit of a running geek. If I've met you, if I saw you talk once, if I went to school with you (which I guess falls under the first one I listed), if I know you off the internet, if you are some fast person in Canada, I will likely stalk your races online (when I remember). I'm hoping that's not creepy. I find it interesting to see how people I know (kinda) are doing in their races.  It is this that led me to waking up at god-awful-o'clock to watch the Rotterdam marathon (in Dutch!) - to see how Dylan Wykes and Robbie Watson (both crazy fast) would do, and if they would make the Canadian Olympic qualifying time. I was admittedly pulling for Rob - I went to high school with him (he was the year behind me) - we were on the same cross-country team and track team. He was good, and was not as good (if I was in the top 3rd of any race I was pleased). Anyway, I was pulling for him, so I was a bit disappointed he didn't make the time, but was so happy that he PB'd by around 3 minutes. I didn't see much of him after he fell off of the pace of the group he was in (I think it was the lead Dutch man's group, from what I could figure out), but oh well. I also didn't get to see Dylan cross the finish line. The coverage was on the interview with the Dutch guy at the end, and the next thing I knew I saw Dylan across the line. At least I could see the clock and pretty much figured that he was under, but it was sort of sad not to see him cross the line. That being said, if I was Dutch, I'd probably rather see the interview, than see some random guy cross the line. So I totally get that part of it...I just wanted to see him finish, and how frigging pumped he would have been seeing he made the standard.

Also, I had the good fortune of hearing Wesley Korir speak at the end of last year. Very inspiring guy. Anyway, totally stalked him through the Boston marathon, and was wishing I could have watched a feed online. Unfortunately, I was at work, and that sort of thing is frowned upon when one is supposed to be doing the work one is being paid to do. Of course, I also watched a bunch of other runners that I know from the area (including my sister's high school math teacher). I do it out of love and admiration, I swear!

Thursday, April 19, 2012

Recent happenings

Ran a 5km race a couple weeks back and knocked 10 seconds off the PB, which is pretty awesome. What was significantly less awesome was when I saw photos from that race. My new running goal, is to not look so horrible in pictures. I think it will involve being faster. Or bribing photographers to later photoshop me so I don't look so slow. I'm seriously wondering if race photographers somehow know when to take a photo so it's the least flattering pic ever.

I will say one of the more frustrating things about smaller (and possibly shorter) races is that sometimes...sometimes people don't know how to place themselves at the start line. And not being fast as blazes, I end up getting caught behind runners that are either overly optimistic about how fast they are, or don't understand that in a race with 700 people, if you are a 27 minute 5 km runner you shouldn't be right behind the skinny dudes with no socks on at the startline. Not that I overheard someone say "yeah, my dad is hoping for around 27 minutes so he's up there somewhere" from the girl behind me a minute before the start or anything. And it wasn't like I was far back...at least, I don't think. I thought I was appropriately placed. So that was a bit frustrating. I need to know who is around my pace for these local ones so at least I can be around them at the start. That way if I'm going to suffer, we all suffer.

On April 29th I'm running my next half marathon. The goal is to get another minute or so off my time, though it will depend on the weather, I think. The course is hilly, which isn't terribly helpful, but it's local and I'm poor. That's not really a great sales job for the race there, is it? Sadly, it's true though - it's not a fast course. We'll see though. My coach thinks I can do it. I think a lot of it for me has to be getting the right mental space for it. Right now in my running...'career' 5 minute kms in a half seems really fast, at least, in my head in seems fast. And right now I'm supposed to race just a little slower than than per kilometre. And I think I can definitely psych myself out if I get stuck on it being kind of fast, and not think that I can actually do it. So we'll see how it goes. Hopefully the weather will be better than last year, when it was cold and began to rain part way through. The last two halfs I've done have been in the rain, and I'm kind of not loving it. Bring on the overcast, cool mornings!