As some of you may know, I did not do much running at all growing up. I was introduced to the sport of swimming by my Mom at the age of 5. My Dad introduced me to cycling from about the age of 7 but I never got real exposure to running as a sport except for the odd cross country race in primary school and high school.
I ran my first half marathon here in the Cayman Islands at the end of January 2008 (Stride against Cancer) with my friend Terry in a time of 2:07. I attempted the 13.1 mile event after only 2 months of training and clearly recall that it was about a 90% effort for me to run this time as I did not have much of an aerobic base.
Fast forward 4 years later which gets me to the Cayman Islands half marathon which took place on the 4th of December 2011. If you live in the States or ever consider a vacation in the Cayman Islands then I can highly recommend entering for the Cayman Islands half or full marathon. Further details about the event can be found at http://www.caymanislandsmarathon.com/.
Since December 2008 I have used the Cayman half as a benchmark to measure my running fitness from year to year and to determine to what extend my running has improved. I ran the half in 1:38 in Dec 2008 and 1:33 in Dec 2010. I was thus eager to improve on my PB of 1:33 in the 2011 Cayman half event.
A couple of days before the race my friend Marius suggested to me that I should try and run without my heart rate monitor and Garmin GPS watch. I was a bit skeptical at first but just decided to leave my watch at home on Sunday morning. Thanks for the tip Marius, it worked.
I ran based on how I felt (Level of perceived exertion) and tried to stick with Conrad and Neal going out as I knew they were capable of going sub 1:30 and even faster. My goal was to get as close to 1:30 as I could if not 1:29.
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| With my wife who also ran the Cayman half |
I felt pretty strong going out and ran my 10km PB time of 42:50 in the process. I definitely ran out about 1min 30sec too fast. I dropped Neal somewhere before South Sound dock which was a mistake. Neal, I know you must have thought what a crazy move as you came past me close to the turn around point and there was no way I could keep up with you on the way back.
It was tough heading back as it was very windy at stages going up South Sound and Walkers road.
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| Crossing the finish line in a time of 1:31 |
About 1.5 miles before the finish I saw Ray in the distance and was closing in on him. I managed to catch Ray in the last mile and was very happy with my 8th place overall out of 515 runners. I placed 15th overall in the 2011 race and was thus happy with my new PB of 1:31 and higher overall placing.
I joked with Ray after the race as I mentioned to him that Sunday's win was for the Augusta half ironman in September 2010 as Ray beat me by about 40sec in the Augusta race in 2010.
I have signed up for the Miami half marathon on the 29th of January 2012 and my goal is to train smart during the festive season to be able to run a 1:29 for this race. Further details regarding the Miami half and full marathon can be found here http://www.ingmiamimarathon.com/
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