Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Two Days Later

Thanks to everyone for the encouragement and congratulations via e-mail, comments to this blog or Facebook. Also a big thanks again to all who sponsored me and helped me to raise money for the new Buddhist centre. (It is still of course possible, just click here!).

Two days after the event I feel surprisingly fit and well. It rained during virtually the whole time, which may indeed have been better than if it had been sunny. Apart from soggy feet, it helped to prevent me from dehydrating. To avoid this hazard I also drank litres of water and 'power drinks' at every refreshments station along the way, where I likewise consumed countless bananas.

Despite all the fears and expectations of hitting 'the wall' around the 30 or 35 km mark I experienced nothing of the sort, which in a wierd kind of way is something of a disappointment! Did I do something wrong? Apart from the super sense of satisfaction of having fulfilled this goal and of having helped raise money for the new Buddhist centre, I am really impressed by the accuracy of the training plan that I followed. The plan was to run the course in 3 hours and 47 minutes and came from 'the book'. In the event I ran it in 3:46:47, thirteen seconds within the limit. Similarly I completed my half marathon in April around half a minute in time. It was helpful to have a pulse meter which helped me to maintain a fairly constant pace, and I could also make sure I didn't set out too fast at the beginning.

The photos were taken by Mokshasiddha at 14km (left) and 40 km (right).

For anyone interested in such things, the split timings were as follows: 

Split        Time of day     TimeDiffmin/kmkm/h
5 km09:36:53         00:25:28         25:28          05:06           11.79
10 km10:03:1700:51:5126:2305:1711.37
15 km10:30:1701:18:5127:0005:2511.11
20 km10:56:4901:45:2326:3205:1911.31
Half11:02:3501:51:1005:4705:1611.41
25 km11:23:3202:12:0620:5605:2211.18
30 km11:51:4002:40:1428:0805:3810.66
35 km12:18:3303:07:0826:5405:2311.15
40 km12:46:3703:35:1228:0405:3710.69

More statistics:

My overall pace was 5:23 minutes per km
My average heart rate was 156
I finished 10,397th out of 34,027 overall
Of the men in the 50-54 age group I was 1088 of 3322
Among all the men I was 10397 out of 26597

The atmosphere was of course terrific despite the rain, as was the constant encouragement from the crowds. It was wonderful too to see many friends along the way.No doubt many memories will remain with me for many years to come. One of the more bizarre memories is of being massaged after the race in the rain on the lawn in front of the Reichstag! 

Although it was a great day which I will never forget, I do not intend to change my mind about not repeating the experience. I have already registered for next year's Berlin half marathon on 3rd April, but I will stick to halves in future.




































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