Time: 6 am
Distance: 9.6 Km
Duration: 81 min 56 sec
Place: Electronic City, Bangalore
I woke up with great enthusiasm to run my first long run of
9.6 Km. I had a banana before leaving home. I started the jog pretty nice. On
reaching a distance of 1 Km I felt a bit exhausted and hence started walking a
bit. I was bit disappointed that I could not jog continuously for at least 2.4
Km like last time. In fact I hoped that I would be able to jog continuously for
4 Km.
Today I felt exhausted very frequently though my jogging and
walking pace comparably improved. I could not exactly figure out why but I
guess maybe I should take more food. When I was around 3 Km mark I kind of
decided that I will quit the course immediately for today. But something made me to continue the run.
I reached half the course of 4.8 Km in 37 minutes today
which means I have improved by 2 minutes. This means that my jogging and
walking pace has increased a bit which is a very positive sign in spite of my
frequent exhaustion. After reaching 4.8 Km I quickly had couple of sips of
Gatorade. This is the first time I am taking something during my run. Gatorade
quickly quenched my thirst and boosted my energy. Well, you might wonder from where I got the
Gatorade to drink. I have parked my car in a place in which I have stored my
Gatorade. This is my start-point, end-point, u-turn and water-station. After
having a quick sip I started for another 4.8 Km.
I had serious doubts if I can really finish the second half
of the course. Whenever I felt exhausted I took no second thoughts and started
to walk. This has been my strategy and it seems to work fine for me. After the
short walk I get a boost in energy which helps me to jog with a good pace. In
fact I felt that my jogging pace tremendously increased in the second half of
the course though my walking activity was very frequent.
Finally I finished the 9.6 Km course in 81 minutes which
means I took 44 minutes to finish the second-half. I am really impressed about
this as I assumed that I would require more time to finish the second-half.
On an average now I am running for 8 Km/h which I heard is
the normal pace. I have maintained this pace even for 9.6 Km which means my
stamina helps me to maintain the pace almost the whole course.
Today I did not feel any pain in my legs anywhere while
climbing the stairs to my home. In fact my legs were so free that I felt more
comfortable climbing the stairs. This astonished me. I expected lot of pain due
to the long run but it is completely the other way round.
This whole day I did not feel any pain in my legs. I think
my legs are now getting used to these long distance runs. I can see lot of
improvements in my leg’s strength. But I am little bit concerned about the frequent
exhaustion which happened today. I could run only 1 Km continuously. By looking
at the improvements in my pace and strength I think I can overcome this problem
sooner or later.
So far, so good. I am enjoying this training schedule. I
really hope I can participate in the Kaveri Trail Half Marathon race.
Tomorrow is a cross training session. According to Hal Higdon we can choose activities like swimming, cycling or walking. I do not know swimming and I do not own a bicycle. So my only choice is walking and so I have planned for an hour long walk. See you tomorrow.
