And the beat goes on...

With the Ironbridge half finished for 2009, my appeal for a fresh target drew only the suggestion that I move up to a full marathon, which was not quite what I had in mind. Firstly, to run twice the distance I would probably have to do twice the training, midweek runs of 3 & 4 miles become 6 & 8 miles, long Sunday runs of up to 2 hours would now take 4 hours, and I just don't fancy committing to that much time spent running. Secondly, my initial target was a podium finish in the over-60s, which would probably require a time of about 1:45. So, I had a time to aim for. The sort of target that I was looking for was more along the lines of a 4-minute mile, or make the Welsh team for the 2010 Commonwealth games. Bearing in mind how far my last target was from a world-class performance, and that I failed to achieve it, I probably need a more realistic goal!
Time rolls on, and the Telford Sexarathon starts with the Lilleshall 10km. Perhaps I should explain. The Sexarathon is a six-race series, one race a month from April to September, with an overall winner being the person who gains most points in the series - a bit like the F1 championship, but without the sponsorship.
My first clever thought was to save money by entering the series right at the outset, and get a discount for entering all 6 races - a bit like buy 5, get 1 free. But before I did that, I thought that I'd save another £12 by joining a club, and not paying the surcharge for being unattached. So I joined Telford Harriers. As an unemployed, it cost me £9, so I'm £3 ahead on that deal. In order to join, I went along on a club night, and joined a group going for a training run, including a woman called Lisa.
And last night was the Lilleshall 10km. I'd left it quite late to enter, what with waiting until I'd joined the Harriers, so I still hadn't received my number when I left just after 6 pm, got there to find parking was getting rather crowded, and I looked as if I'd left it a bit late. However, I found registration, got my number, got it pinned on, and still had time to spare when I got to the start. The race itself started uphill, then ran around the gardens of Lilleshall Hall. Very attractive gardens, but did we have to use those gravel paths? It's like running through sand. Then, we head out along the main entrance drive, passing kilometre markers as we go. I pass the 3 km in what looks like 16 minutes on my watch, and I do a quick conversion into 3 km = 2 miles = 8 minute miles = OK, then I remember that 2 miles is a bit further than 3 km, so it's not quite so OK. After all, I was running 8 minute miles for about the first 7 miles of Ironbridge. Then we go through 4 km in just over 20 minutes, about 5 minutes per km = 8 minute miles, so I'm feeling a bit better about my pace. Just then, the pace car comes the other way, reading 19 minutes. Obviously, we must have started just after 7 pm on my watch, and I'm well ahead of 8 minute mile pace. Also, the leader is now about 2 km ahead of me, and on course for what I worked out to be about 35 minutes. It turned out that he was on course for a much faster time, just over 31 minutes, winning by a clear 2 minutes. He was certainly well clear at that point.
One of the things about the sort of course that we were running, where we ran out from the hall along the entrance drive, turned around at the entrance gates, and then ran back, is that you can see how many people are ahead of you as they all come streaming past you before you reach the turning point. You also get to see how many people are behind you, including...a woman called Lisa. Plugging away uphill back towards the Hall, and it's starting to get a bit tough, even tougher when Lisa comes past me, asking if I'm allright!
It gets tougher still when we get back into the garden, and have to plough through those gravel paths again, but I keep going, encouraged by passing a youngish guy in Wrekin Road Runners strip, and finally pick up the style to cross the line in decent form, but with no big finish left in me.
Results were out today, and I finished 167th out of 276, my worst performance since Delamere in terms of the % of the field who beat me, in a time of 49 minutes 39 secs, which at 159% of the winner's time, is again my worst result since Delamere. On the positive side, I was 3rd 60 year-old, disappointingly only 10 seconds behind 2nd man, and I DID beat 5 minute kilometres for the entire distance, and the Lucozade site converted to a 1:49 half-marathon, nearly 4 seconds faster than the converted time for Action Heart, and the actual time for Ironbridge.
How do I square the "worst performance" figures from the start of the paragraph above with the "best performance" figures at the end? Firstly, the winner was 2 minutes clear of the field - I ran 150% of the 2nd man, much the same as Ironbridge. Secondly, this was a much more professional field, with much less of a turnout of "fun" runners. A final thought on Ironbridge, where my actual time was slower than that predicted by Action Heart: At Action Heart, I was so bushed that I had nothing left for a big finish, whereas at Ironbridge, I had saved something. It would seem that running at a steady pace, and finishing the race with nothing left is the way to get your best time (University of the Bleeding Obvious)
Now, the rest of the Sexarathon is shorter races, 3 & 4 milers, so it's down to speed training, and let's see if I can make up those 10 seconds...