well, it was an early and cold morning today at the eastern-most tip of north america, Cape Spear, NL... a cloudy and drizzly 1 degrees! i and 400 others embarked on the 3rd annual Cape to Cabot 20k road race, one of the hilliest 20k races in the entire world.
i found myself struggling severely with the uphill portions due to my respiratory issue. i can't really handle running up hills of any magnitude, due to my inability to take in enough oxygen... so i took those nice and slow but made up for them with 3 awesome downhill k sprints.. i actually had 3 separate km which i ran faster than 4.30, which was exciting.
i negative split the race by exactly 1 second, giving me a time of 1.00.18 and 1.00.17 respectfully. a personal worst one the course overall, but by far the most satisfying and consistent race out of the 3. it's nice to know that i have a solid understanding of where my running is at these days. if you don't know where you are, you won't be able to plan for improvement.
now the off season officially begins as i will plan to rest up the knees for a while and focus on cross training, and then will go hard at it in the winter in prep for Boston and Big Sur marathons in April
Jenn
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
Congratulations Jennifer!
Those hills, oh those hills! You've gotta be one tough cookie to face that course! Be proud!
hills, combined with wind and cold rain, and no sleep the night before, definitely make for an interesting running experience.. lol strangely enough, i was laughing and smiling before the race while the other 399 people appeared shivering and miserable.. i really enjoy this run, probably my favourite race of them all, even though i seem to be getting progressively worse, and produce runs that fall far short of my expectations.. i now hold the distinction of being the only runner to complete 3 C2Cs in a row with progressively worse times.. but next year, i am determined to end the streak!
Jennifer - I really really enjoyed this race too, but that could also be because I chose not to wear shorts and light shirt! There were indeed some cold looking folk at the start at Cape Spear! I had tights, windbreaker, hat, light gloves - and I regularly run here in NWT at sub-30 temperatures. I ain't stupid! I've also told people how amazing - and tough! - this race is and I just posted a very favourable review of it at Canadian Runner magazine's website. I'm planning C2C 2010 already and hope to see you there - can't believe I missed you this year, particularly as we were so close at finish! At least I got to have a chat with you at MUN 5 K.
Post a Comment