First Road Run for 2010 - Army Half Marathon

My first road run race for the year. Base on my watch, posted a 1:58:14. Doubt the difference is going to be much from the official timing, but should be in the region of a couple of seconds only. Nonetheless, this is a 13min improvement over last year's AHM. Not my personal best though coz I just did a TT 2 weeks back in 1:51. The distance marker was the same as my footpod all the way till the 13th km but found that I had to run an additional 500m to the end point. So its either my footpod was slightly off or the distance for the race was wrong. Oh well, whatever it is, I was short of my 1:50 target. I had thought I should be able to push it but my silly legs just could not work find the pace after 15km, despite having negative splitted the 2 halves.

I stayed in the front pack at the start line. Coach said to do so, so that I wont get blocked up by the straddlers. And even allow the blokes to go ahead of me right from the start. I just had to stick to my prescribed heart rates. Frankly, I have not trained to go at this HR for such a distance. For the whole run, I was in Zone4. So that in itself was an achievement.

I do not have any excuse for a less than expected timing. My illness cant be used as an excuse. Neither the 3 bridges that all runners had to overcome. Not even the weather - after all, I completed the race when the sun was just up. No, age cant be used as an excuse either. In fact, it only goes to show that I will need to build up my running base. I think there is still room to improve. And Rome was not build in a day. I have only started on endurance training for 2 years. From a sedated couch potato for most of the 10 years since I started work, I think I have come a long way.

There were probably a few thousand more runners ahead of me? But I think there were even more behind me. Should be top 50% at least? As I drove away from the race site, I saw there were many more runners on Nicoll Highway. Good job fellas, for having decided to embark on this running journey. Hopefully they had found the fruition as much as I have myself.