The pre-race photo is above, Tenke (who came second in the ladies race), me, Jason and Stefan. Unfortunately, after missing the Nyon tri Richard also missed out on this run too. Like a mackrel freshly caught on the west coast of scotland, he was well and truely gutted to be missing out!
The traffic was heavy and my estimate of 13mins to get there was way off. The warm up was the sprint from the car to the hall to get the numbers!
At the start Jason and Stefan positioned themselves cunningly at the back to chat way the first couple of kms and I wished Tenke well as she pushed to the front and I settled where the club runners seemed to out number the cotton t-shirts, about 250-300 from the front.
The start was bang on 7pm and we headed up - even on the wide road it was a struggle to get to race pace and then it narrowed to single track roads where it was even harder to overtake. Slow progress.
In the trees the guy 3 in front of me went over and was covered in dust, but unhurt. That was enough to put an end to my sprinting through the trees to overtake people. Out of the woods and finally some down hill and the field opens up a bit. Two kids in front become my mark and I try and catch them. I notice the hrt is close to red line, but I decided I'm going slowly and will live with it. (86% of max was ave!). Also notice how I move through the field on the down hills (see my skipping works) and on the ups - some specific training paying off too. Unfortunately, on the flat I'm slower than everyone else and so I trade places with lots of people lots of times.
At about 6km I see the family again, Paul tells me I'm in the top 150 so I decide to hold that spot and try to move up the field a little. Turns out he just guessed that but it was a good guess and about right. I finished 136th of 533 men and 39th in my age group (out of 187).
At 7km it goes from the lake back up before looping around to my long run route's farthest point and I know the way home well. Take every corner nicely using the racing line to stop anyone coming past on the last km. Very narrow and my reps pay of as the back to speed from the right angle turns is no problem. I'm at the back of a group of 4 as we hit 100m to go and I let rip, all three melt away and I go through well ahead to cheers from the family.
I made my time 41:10, but officially I was 41:26 (which is about the gun time). I was dissappointed at first, but the course was busy, tough and hilly. However, looking at the hrt data I think I would have struggled to put in much more effort. Next time I will start in the thick of the club runners. Things can only get better, plus as I've never run the course before that's another PB in the bag!
Click here for the offical times
St Prex TPV etape 1 by nmcintyre at Garmin Connect - Details
3 comments:
Congratulations for your race !
I happened to be there and to finish a few seconds ahead of you ;-) It's always interesting to read how other runners enjoyed their race. Btw I have also blogged my race (in french)
http://bob-runner.over-blog.com/article-cr-tpv-etape-1---st-prex-11-aout-2010-55403562.html
Maybe we'll meet during one of the forthcoming TPV etapes.
Hi Alain, or is it Bob le coureur? If I had realised you were so close I would have kicked at 200m not 100m. Mecri bein pour le comment, on se voit a Genolier.
It's Alain, Bob is my pen name.
I finished in 40'31, so you should have kicked earlier than 200 m ;-)
See you in Genolier.
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