Seven Seconds

Twas the night before Christmas ... actually, it was Christmas morning, and the creatures in the house had already been stirring and gone through the presents, which their behaviour throughout the year definitely had not really merrited - Santa, you sucker!

But at 9:30 I was standing on the start line of the annual GOAL mile in Shanganagh park. I had learned my lesson from last year, namely that it's a bad idea to start at the 9:40 slot if you want to run (relatively) fast because you run into the tail end of the 9:30 field, so this time I had made sure to leave early enough to still being able to easily jog down to the park on time.

There was a guy who was apparently pacing someone else to a 6-minute mile, which I thought was very handy and I would try and stay with him, but as soon as we started he tore down the road at what was definitely not 6-minute pace. In fact, looking at the GPS track later on I was actually pacing myself pretty well, so he must have done faster than 5:30 pace. I mean, obviously everyone is entitled to run at whatever pace they want, but surely if you announce that you're going to run at 6-minute pace ... ah well.

I lost a few places halfway through the mile as I started to get tired and there was just that old fella - no, not me, the OTHER old fella I mean! - and I tried to keep at his coat tails, and we did push each other along pretty well, and I'm sure he felt the acid burn in the legs just as badly as I did. I knew there was a reason why I had opted for ultra running. I would never have made a great miler, neither my muscle fibre composition nor my mental attitude would have been suitable. Anyway, I tried to give it wellies on the finish straight, as did the other guy, obviously, and try as you might my old legs just would not turn any faster and I finished in 6:05.

Seven seconds. Seven seconds slower than last year!

Now I have a measure how much I have slowed down over the last 12 months. And that was while actually feeling better than at the end of last year, when that 24 hours race still somehow had a grip on my legs muscles.

Seven seconds. Actually, that's not even a bad deterioration, considering that I have lost closer to a minute per mile since 2014, so that's actually a decreasing rate of deterioration if you can look at it like that.

And then I spent the next three days being sick.

It wasn't that GOAL mile, I already had a sore throat that morning but no, I'm absolutely sure it had no impact on my time in Shanganagh park at all, no excuses.

And how do the legs feel after three days of no running? Fresh and bouncy after a good recovery? Do they f*ck!!! I feel like I just spent half a year de-training on the couch, the hamstrings almost felt tingly from being overworked at 9:30 pace. Crikey. This getting old business really is a tough one!

Oh, and Happy New Year! Hope you had a nice break over Christmas.