10km, Olympisch Stadionloop, Amsterdam

13/11/2011
10km
Amsterdam, The Netherlands
42:25
4:15 min/km
177 hrm
38/349 (10.9%)

Why is it that my pre-race preparations always suck? Today I didn't get much sleep as my needy cat around 7:00 decided that I've slept enough (no, I really did not). So my initial happiness at the fact that the race is at noon so I'll be able to get amble sleep before, didn't quite work in practice. Oh well.

Then meeting Thyra, Michal & Gerben and off to the Olympic Stadium. At least from then on everything was going smoothly, we were plenty in advance, I registered on-site, warm-up and off we go! Oh and the weather was really perfect for a race!

At the beginning I was trying to follow Michal & Julek but their tempo was just insane for me, even though I didn't quite know it as my watch was not properly calibrated and I didn't do a very good job at spotting kilometer marks at the beginning. I was trying not to loose them but around the 3rd kilometer they already had around 100m on me and were gaining distance and by then I knew that I'm out of their league (in fact I should have known it from the start).

Halfway through, on the 5K mark I still had the time for my new personal best but it was not meant to be -- from then on I slowed down. A lot. I finished in 42:25 -- my worst time since 2008. Should it be telling me something? Probably. But I'm not going to over analyze it. Not yet anyway. For now the only lesson for the future I'm going to take from this run is that next Sunday in the Seven Hills run in Nijmegen I'll need to take things real easy; basically just run to chalk up yet another race. Gladly, I've never before run on 15K, so trying to beat my PB will not be an issue ;).

P.S. All the others I ran with set their new PBs so blaming slow course is not an option ;). Congratulations Thyra, Michal & Gerben -- you all did an amazing job. Mighty impressive!

Comments

Thyra said…
I don't get it: why is the lesson to "take it easy" next week? Shouldn't it be the opposite?! Or maybe the lesson should be to go to bed earlier and wear earplugs to help ignore your cats meows in the morning. That's what I do with mine... :D
November 13, 2011 at 12:42 PM
Adam Koprowski said…
For my cat earplugs are not enough (at least for me, I'm a real light sleeper).
Why take it easy? I did not take it easy today and where did it get me? So I should not have my hopes high for next week. Of course I'm going to do my best but at least I'll try to avoid setting unrealistic goals.
November 13, 2011 at 12:45 PM
jean said…
A little speedwork on the track and more runningdrills will get you out of the slum. And by the way who is this otner polish lightbold jules?
November 13, 2011 at 1:42 PM
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