The T-Shirt Plan

I took to the quite country roads of east Cork for my first race since the Connemara Ultra over 6 weeks ago. The Ballyandreen 5, the first in the Ballycotton 5 mile summer series kicked off last night with a record crowd of 520 runners. My aim this year is to complete all four races in the series and maybe win a T-shirt for my efforts. If you manage to complete all 4 races over the summer and your overall time is within the top 50 (15 for women) you get a free T-shirt - can't wait!

To be quite honest my running form is nowhere near what it was at the start of the year and with an average of 3 runs a week over the last 5 weeks I wasn't planning on hitting the PB stakes just yet - but I will before the summer's out. With that in mind I settled into the middle of the pack with a few from the club who were training for the upcoming Cork marathon and going out at a manageable 3hr+ marathon pace (6:50 or thereabouts). It took us about 12 seconds to cross the start line and we took it relatively easy for the first half mile before picking up the pace once we were past the worst of the traffic jam.

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The first mile was a net uphill averaging 6:54 (7:06 on the timekeepers clock). Mile 2 down into Ballycotton was a net downhill particularly over the 2nd half where I took advantage of the hill to pick up the pace - Mile 2 in 6:19. During Mile 3 I kept with the increased effort which was reasonably comfortable and continued to pick off runners in front of me. Mile 3 in 6:27.

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Mile 4 was a net uphill with the last 0.3 miles consisting of a 100 foot climb. I was passed by a guy at about mile 3.5 but remained 5 to 10 yards behind him plugging our way up the hill and picking off a few tiring souls. The hill eventually levelled out as we passed the 4 mile mark. Mile 4 in 7:00. I took a look at my watch to check my pace before heading into the downhill mile to the finish. A Marshall told me to forget about the watch and run. I took his advice and focused instead on the runners in front of me and particularly the only guy that had passed me since I crossed the start line. I let the brakes off and picked up the pace continuing to accelerate more or less until I crossed the finish line. With about half a mile to go I was past the guy who had passed me. I thought he would put up a fight so I kept increasing the pace taking full advantage of the hill and continued to pass runners coming in towards the finish passing 2 in the last 20 yards.

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Maybe it was the fact that I had saved my legs over the first half of the race that I managed to pick off so many runners over the last half mile or maybe my downhill running has much improved (the switch to the bike over the last month may have something to do with that) Mile 5 in 5:40 - 32:20 Overall (32:32 clock time)

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I came 96th overall so I have my work cut out for me if I want that T-shirt. Then again not all of those in front of me were men and of those that were not all will run the full series, fingers crossed.

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Despite the low running volume I still manged to get a 20 and 18 mile long run in over the last 2 weekends and will now follow the traditional taper for Cork, deciding against training through it.

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