Royal Parks Half Marathon

The Royal Parks Half Marathon was my first full-blown race, officially-timed, and my first attempt at the 21.1K distance. Never did that distance before, even during my practise runs, and my body is screaming at me not to do it again. But we’ll see.

The race was pretty comfortable for the first 10K, but when I hit 13K, my hip started to hurt and I had to drop down to a walk to recover.

The remaining race was much slower than the first half with my hip and my hamstring (both of them) hurting like hell. Even when I got to towards the finish line, people were walking. One of them had pulled muscle, so I stopped to help him out for a bit. He was concerned about my time, but as long as I finish, I’m happy.

I got over the finish line in 2:03:35 according to Endomondo, and my official time was 2:07:33. Considering this was my first half marathon, and I managed to average 6:00 min/km (I hit 20K at 2:00:00).

It was a painful journey home too. My legs hurt like hell, climbing up or down stairs made the pain spike, but it’s getting easier now.

I don’t think I’ll be running a full marathon any time soon, until I can get the Half Marathon distance down comfortably. It was really hard going at the end:

vlcsnap-2015-10-12-09h24m04s764

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And plenty of new achievements and awards from Nike+

HM1 HM2 HM3 HM4 HM5 HM6

RPHM App

Just got an email from the RPHM organisers. There’s an app in the Google Play store that allows you to track the runners (including me) during the race, and also provides split times as they run over the timing mats. For runners, it also shows you where you are on the course at that time. Although I wouldn’t recommend it — you need to make sure you’re not running into the barriers :D

Google Play: http://royalparksfoundationemail.org.uk/1L97-3PL8Z-ERXF5H-1SKAD2-1/c.aspx

The incredible story of the Berlin Marathon’s courageous winner

Source: The incredible story of the Berlin Marathon’s courageous winner

Eliud Kipchoge won the Berlin Marathon on Saturday. You probably didn’t know this if you’re American. That’s fine; marathons don’t make for great spectating, and the Boston Marathon is the only race that really becomes part of the national conversation stateside.

But you’re going to want to hear just how Kipchoge won the Berlin Marathon. That’s the real story here, one both inspiring and maddening at the same time.

Eventually both insoles would become so dislodged that Kipchoge was forced to run most of the race with an insole hanging out of each shoe.

Shoes
Kipchoge’s shoes. Imagine running like this.

IMAGE: MICHAEL SOHN/ASSOCIATED PRESS

But there was no way to stop. Fixing the problem would waste precious time, and the irritation had grown so great there was no guarantee he’d be able to commence running again once he’d stopped.

And the most important line of the article:

“I had pain in my foot, but what could I do?” he told Runner’s World. “I had to finish the race.”

It looks like a lot of work…

Wally: According to my fitness tracker, I took 20,000 steps yesterday.

Alice: What? That’s double what I did. You won’t win this! I will run to the ends of the earth to beat your step count!

Dilbert: Do you really have a fitness tracker?

Wally: No, it looks like a lot of work.

Source: Dilbert Comic Strip on 2015-09-29 | Dilbert by Scott Adams

RPHM Training

健毅 黃 was out running. He tracked 10.24 km in 1h:04m:05s.

http://app.endomondo.com/workouts/609724257/2918479

Posted from WordPress for Android

10Ks are going to start being my foundation runs – like 5Ks used to be. Today, I beat my recent 10K record too.

Screenshot from 2015-09-28 19-10-17

RPHM Training

健毅 黃 was out running. He tracked 15.60 km in 1h:38m:57s.

http://app.endomondo.com/workouts/604368970/2918479

Posted from WordPress for Android

RPHM Training

 

Forgot to blog my long run from Saturday last week:

I was out running 13.32 km on Sep 12 with #Endomondo #endorphins goo.gl/LWHpTG

And managed to break my 10k record surprisingly:

10k-Sept12

Commuter Frustration #3 – Spitting

This seems to be a norm these days, but it is still unhygenic and disgusting. I’d love to push the spitter’s face into their own spit and order them to lick up every drop of it…. But I’d probably be violating their “human rights”….