2 weeks ago, I completed my first ever Half Marathon! (21.1km). Overall it was a fabulous experience and the culmination of 5 months hard work after my knee surgery.
The morning started well with my lifts in getting us there in good time and with great parking only a few minutes walk from Fed Square. There was a fair bit of hanging around and chatting while we warmed up and waited for the 7am start.
I started out with my nephew Zach and our friend Sue, but our longer legs left Sue behind at the first hill. We looped around the front of Etihad, along the docs and back past the Polly Woodside. At that point Zach looked at his watch and mentioned we were doing 5-6min/km, which was a fair bit too fast for me, I’d been planning on closer to 7min/km.
I lost Zach when I stopped for a loo stop at 8km and powered on past the 10km mark, realising I was a) Half Way and b) beyond where I’d ever run continuously before. I kept up a solid pace right through to the 14km mark, where I started to walk/run. About this time I spotted both Sue and TP (a friend of Bernie’s from School) while we were on a 2-way section of the course, but I never saw them again, despite the fact that TP must have passed me at some stage, as she finished a few minutes ahead of me. (She also did a lot more longer training than I did.)
As I ran past the front of Vodafone Arena, I was starting to get some cramps in the top of my calves, but there was a lady in front of me on the bridge across to the MCG that was doing jumping high-knees, and I asked if that helped… She said it was great to stretch the legs differently, so I changed up my stride a bit, was able to relax the calves and keep going. I was about that time that a woman in a Wonder-Woman costume passed me, and I made it my goal to beat her, if I possibly could. My pace picked up to 6, 5 and even nearly 4min/km as I powered home, beating Wonder Woman by a few seconds.
Final time was 2:21:32.1 well inside my goal of 2.5 hours.
Overall, it was a great morning out, topped off by brunch with the guys at Huxtaburger in Rungwood. Lots of fun, I’ll be back next year.
My Strava Page has a great interactive view of the run.
Some gratitudes to finish: Huge Thank you to Ross Kinsella for all his efforts and rehab exercises to get to and through my knee surgery in Feb. Leigh Stamation for being my Rehab encourager and trainer!
Everyone from Lillydale Lake Parkrun and Up ‘n Active – Further * Stronger * Faster for putting crazy ideas like a Half
Marathon in my head, especially those there on the day: Sue, Geoff, Mak, Eron, Dodge and my chauffeurs on the day Zach & Kylie
Huge thanks to my sweetheart Bernie for love, encouragement and post race massage!
Thank you everyone!
#RunMelbourne2017
