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| What's their secret? Third and first women |
Day 361
Parkrun: Hilly Fields parkrun results for event #140. Your time was 00:23:18.
1mile warm up, 1mile warm down
It was cool and blustery, but I thought I was running pretty strongly, and kept up with the two above (and Jo, who came in second woman) for the first lap, so half hoped for a Hillyfields PB, although it was not to be. Back to the drawing board.
It could be: I still have fatigue in my legs from the Assembly League
It could be: the wind was against me
It could be: the lack of sleep catching up with me
It could be: I'm carrying extra weight
It's clearly time to stop making excuses. I watch the four women ahead of me as they over take me (number four and I had a bit of a tussle - she overtook me uphill, I got her on the descents, but she took me on the last ascent and finished 5 seconds ahead) and can see they aren't going that fast, which means my towering efforts probably look ridiculous, given the modest amount of ground I cover panting, puffing and practically having a seizure all the while.
I quiz the women who are faster than me about their diet and sleep habits. Most are of the same mind as me – regretting vast chocolate intake over Easter, suffering from lack of sleep, pleased that they are more or less off alcohol until after the marathon – none of them have particularly restrictive diets or mimic Rift Valley living. They're just faster. I can take some comfort that none of the women who beat me today were anywhere near my age, but the Dulwich Runners I referred to on Thursday have many over 50s in their ranks, with Power of 10 rankings sky high.
Look at Ros Tabor and her marathon PB of 3:09 at the age of 55 or so.
So, my nosing around other women's training habits doesn't yield any great insights, but it keeps me out of mischief. I should take comfort in the fact that 23.18 is only 14 seconds off my Hillyfields PB. I vow to have it down to 22:45 by the end of the year.
Postscript: Ros Tabor ran the exact same time as I did today, at the first ever Hillyfields Parkrun, in 2012.
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