Tag Archives: Victoria Marathon

2011 Goodlife Fitness Victoria Marathon

Posted on by

1

This thanksgiving Jesse and I spent the weekend in Victoria. For 2 reasons; 1) to visit my best friend and 2) run the Goodlife Fitness Victoria 1/2 marathon.

This was an amazing race and a good personal race for myself. The course was fast but not flat. There was enough elevation change to make it interesting for a road marathon. I decided to run this race by doing 10 and 1′s. This is running 10 minutes walking one and staying diligent to this regardless of feeling great or shitty. After the first 10 minutes it took all of my will power to stop and walk for a minute. My course goal was under 2 hours or 2 hours flat. I ended up running a 2:04, which was 4 minutes off my goal and finished in the top 50% of my age category.

None the less I was really happy with this time for a few reasons,

  • I have been having horrid stomach problems as of late
  • I have been training for XC and trail exclusively

In retrospect I could have run a 2 hour for sure.

The day before the race I did a 4 km prep run out onto the breakwater and along Dallas road; it was awesome and a good warm up to elevation change. But for some reason my Garmin decided not to record that run; it has been doing that every so often.

There were 6000 people in the half marathon it took me about 5 minutes to get over the mats to start the race and then I had to do some heavy recon to pass a crap load of people to get in good position. My first 10km was done in about 55 minutes so my split time was really off; this is what pisses me off because I didn’t push out the last half properly. I slowed down on 2- 10 minute sets, which I think cost me that extra time. However it was a great race environment and a well organized course. Aid stations were positioned perfectly and they had a TON of volunteers helping out. Kudos to them. The finish of the race was great the finish shoots were easy to get around and then the food was right there! Next year we will be going back to Victoria to run this again or might go to Kelowna to spice it up. This defiantly will not be the last time I run this marathon.

In other news – The Wednesday night races come to a finish next Wednesday. Always sucks because they are so fun. On Sunday I am running the 5 mile in the Mustard Seed Fall Classic. My legs have been like cement the last few days after the 1/2 and training runs have not been stellar to say the least. Hopefully they can pull it together for Sunday. Ooks race this weekend in Camrose so I will be out there coaching. It will be a bittersweet day because Camrose is my FAVORITE XC course of all time and I have run so well on it; but it is exciting to watch other people compete and enjoy it. I may or may not take them on a run through of the course before the race so I get to run a bit of it!

Photo from Victoria – The best suffer face ever! I am also too cheap to buy them so I take screen shots!

5 Peaks Devon

Posted on by

3

Last Saturday was 5 Peaks Devon; the last of the series! Kind of a bummer because the 5 Peaks races are AWESOME. For the 100th time and last time this year I will say this but the course was marked amazingly, great volunteers, great overall production.

The first 4km of the course was tough a ton of elevation change and great hills. Very few races make my ass hurt the next day but this one did big time. The last few km of the course were easy and fast; I had a great run.

Here is a crappy screen shot of the elevation map of the course.

Now I really enjoyed the 5.5 km mark because I LOVE running down hills; I run very fast down these hills to boot so I pass lots of slow pokes who are worried about their knees! Just zooming away.

Now back to the part about me having a great run. IT WAS AWESOME. This is the first run of any sorts race, training, LSD, you name it that I did not feel like shitting my pants, rolling over and dying from pain, and or puking. Stomach problems are finally at bay for now, which benefited the crap out of me Saturday. I did not run 100% because I was being cautious about my stomach but I ran hard and well. I finished 11th overall in my age category and was like 1 minute away from being 6th or 7th. It is amazing how much seconds matter in some races. After the race I had so much energy I could have run it again I was bouncing all over the place; Jesse thought I was crazy. I also raced in my new Saucony A4′s since my Fastwitch ones died and the new Fastwitch’s are not as nice; they are equally awesome. All in all such a great race, day, and people.

My training has been focused on cross country/trail as of late. My stomach has also put a damper on the long run training. The next races I have coming up are 2 Wednesday night races (XC) and the Victoria half marathon. Since the half is less than two weeks away so I will try to throw in a few long runs on road before we get to Victoria next Friday.

Week of training

Monday – 6km of hill repeats Keillor Road hill
Tuesday – REST
Wednesday – 6 km George Smith Special Wed Night Race
Thursday – 16 x 1 w/2 Trail
Friday – 8km tempo
Saturday – Rest or 5km road OOKS are in Calgary racing – I am there coaching
Sunday – 15km LSD

Here are some photos from the race on Saturday some good suffer face in some of them!

Suffer faceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee ^

 

As the 5 Peakers say…..

Get off the road!