Hey fellow fitness maniac,
Yesterday the 31st of January 2014 marked my very first competitive running race, in which I took part in the 2014 MRR Half Marathon in Muscat, Oman.
As I mentioned earlier, I never came close to the distance of the race which is about 21.1 kilometers. My longest run during my training in the last few months was a 14.1 kilometers in 1:20:02 with a pace of 5:41 min/km.
Of course with this being my first race and with no prior experience I did not set a real time nor pace goal, but you and I both know how the ego inside us works.
I did a little research and came to conclude that the average finishing time for a half marathon was in the range of two hours, so I wanted to finish mine in less than that, even if it meant hitting the cross line at 1:59:59.
The running course had signs each kilometers for distance reference, but no timers, and my Polar FT7 heart rate monitor's main screen only shows the current heart BPM, so I had no idea about the elapsed time, which was a good thing if you asked me, because this way I could concentrate about just running my own race without feeling the necessity to speed up or slow down.
The real pain started at kilometer 15 if I'm not mistaken, that's when I started feeling the blisters forming and the muscles started aching, but there was no way on earth that I would stop or slow down, I kept going.
I picked up my pace and hit the gas on the last kilometer to make it count, and after passing the finish line I hit the stop button on my HRM to check my time and I was shocked by the what I saw:
The ChampionChip used during the race revealed that my chip time (net time) was actually 1:49:02 and my gross time was 1:49:12 which meant I was averaging about 5:11 min/km.
I know that's not fast or anything, but it meant the world for me because it was way more than what my ego would even dream of.
It's important to mention that I did not incorporate enough running mileage into my training, as I was mainly using Beachbody workouts as training methods.
I will definitely run more in the future.
Yesterday the 31st of January 2014 marked my very first competitive running race, in which I took part in the 2014 MRR Half Marathon in Muscat, Oman.
 |
| Initial running gear plan |
As I mentioned earlier, I never came close to the distance of the race which is about 21.1 kilometers. My longest run during my training in the last few months was a 14.1 kilometers in 1:20:02 with a pace of 5:41 min/km.
Of course with this being my first race and with no prior experience I did not set a real time nor pace goal, but you and I both know how the ego inside us works.
I did a little research and came to conclude that the average finishing time for a half marathon was in the range of two hours, so I wanted to finish mine in less than that, even if it meant hitting the cross line at 1:59:59.
The running course had signs each kilometers for distance reference, but no timers, and my Polar FT7 heart rate monitor's main screen only shows the current heart BPM, so I had no idea about the elapsed time, which was a good thing if you asked me, because this way I could concentrate about just running my own race without feeling the necessity to speed up or slow down.
The real pain started at kilometer 15 if I'm not mistaken, that's when I started feeling the blisters forming and the muscles started aching, but there was no way on earth that I would stop or slow down, I kept going.
I picked up my pace and hit the gas on the last kilometer to make it count, and after passing the finish line I hit the stop button on my HRM to check my time and I was shocked by the what I saw:
 |
| Calories bye bye! |
I know that's not fast or anything, but it meant the world for me because it was way more than what my ego would even dream of.
It's important to mention that I did not incorporate enough running mileage into my training, as I was mainly using Beachbody workouts as training methods.
I will definitely run more in the future.
 |
| First finisher medal, hopefully more to come! |
