Argh, pacing
Sep. 28th, 2014 09:49 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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c25kI'm still running pretty regularly, just have been forgetting to update here. Which is silly, cos the community's in a lovely active phase lately and I'd like to join in with that.
I'm really struggling at the moment with starting out too fast, and getting tired, not so much that I can't go on at all, but enough that I'm getting slower and slower over the run and ending up with a slower average time than I know I'm capable of.
Last Sunday I did 5k along the river from our place in Cambridge. Total time was 41'20'' but basically I was doing 8½' /km or a bit over pretty much the whole way, apart from the first km which I ran in under 7½ minutes. Thursday I ran on the hilly route near campus. A friend called me just as I was setting out to warm up, so I ended up walking along chatting to her, and starting the run about half way along my normal route. So I ran downhill along the railway, and I did the first 20 minutes at a pretty sensible pace, well under 8½ ' /km. Only I just lost it over the last km and nearly ground to a halt, ending with only 3.5 km in 30 minutes.
And today, back in Cambridge, I literally just got slower and slower and slower over the course of the run. First 2km in under 15 minutes (!), next 2 km in 17 minutes and that was a struggle, and the last km, when I normally speed up cos I know the end is in sight, took more than 9 minutes, so 42 minutes overall. I honestly didn't think I was going that fast at the start, I was surprised when Runkeeper gave me the times. And I just found the whole thing really hard, not physically, but psychologically, I was constantly fighting the impulse to just give up and walk, even though my lungs and my legs were basically fine. Even when I only had three minutes to go, I was stuck in a slough of "don't wanna!
I'm thinking I might turn on Runkeeper settings to give me a bit more feedback, maybe more frequent time-checks or perhaps setting a goal pace. My main aim at the moment is to improve my fitness, only secondarily to improve my running technique, so it doesn't matter too much if I rely on the gadget to help me with pacing.
And as of today I have been running regularly every week for 2 years, so that's something to be proud of.
I'm really struggling at the moment with starting out too fast, and getting tired, not so much that I can't go on at all, but enough that I'm getting slower and slower over the run and ending up with a slower average time than I know I'm capable of.
Last Sunday I did 5k along the river from our place in Cambridge. Total time was 41'20'' but basically I was doing 8½' /km or a bit over pretty much the whole way, apart from the first km which I ran in under 7½ minutes. Thursday I ran on the hilly route near campus. A friend called me just as I was setting out to warm up, so I ended up walking along chatting to her, and starting the run about half way along my normal route. So I ran downhill along the railway, and I did the first 20 minutes at a pretty sensible pace, well under 8½ ' /km. Only I just lost it over the last km and nearly ground to a halt, ending with only 3.5 km in 30 minutes.
And today, back in Cambridge, I literally just got slower and slower and slower over the course of the run. First 2km in under 15 minutes (!), next 2 km in 17 minutes and that was a struggle, and the last km, when I normally speed up cos I know the end is in sight, took more than 9 minutes, so 42 minutes overall. I honestly didn't think I was going that fast at the start, I was surprised when Runkeeper gave me the times. And I just found the whole thing really hard, not physically, but psychologically, I was constantly fighting the impulse to just give up and walk, even though my lungs and my legs were basically fine. Even when I only had three minutes to go, I was stuck in a slough of "don't wanna!
I'm thinking I might turn on Runkeeper settings to give me a bit more feedback, maybe more frequent time-checks or perhaps setting a goal pace. My main aim at the moment is to improve my fitness, only secondarily to improve my running technique, so it doesn't matter too much if I rely on the gadget to help me with pacing.
And as of today I have been running regularly every week for 2 years, so that's something to be proud of.
(no subject)
Date: 29/09/2014 08:34 am (UTC)For what it's worth, when I'm trying to keep to a particular pace, I have Runkeeper set to give audio updates every 0.5km, just distance and average pace. Though I'm not actually very good at slowing down in response (I pretty much always set off too fast), but at least I know I'm going too fast and I don't worry that I should be going faster. And then in the second half when I start getting tired and actually slowing down, it does help to know that's what's happening and I usually find I can drag up some reserves to end up near my target pace overall.
Maybe next time I'll try having it update me every 0.25km to see if more frequent feedback helps with not setting off too fast.
I don't bother telling it my target pace, because I find the voice saying "You are ahead of your target pace by zero minutes and three seconds per kilometer" pretty irritating. I feel like saying "I KNOW THAT, I CAN SUBTRACT" even when I'm quite tired and stupid, so not having it know my target pace solves that.