Nike 10K ==> mission accomplished

So it cames the day .... the Hong Kong Nike 10K Race is the largest running extravaganza in town (besides the Hong Kong Marathon) and gathers 7000 starters in a far-away district in the North West corner of the Territory.

This races marked my personal "first anniversary" of the conversion to a different system of training. Last year, same time, I was doing wonders in my interval training workouts but that Sunday, after only 5k, I was struggling ... the last 3k were like climbing a hill, even if the speed was much lower than my interval training.... at the end, I crawled in with a 35'35", with HR climbing to 197bpm by the last 300m (some unforgiving organizer set the finish line on the top of a long overpass).
So this year was very meaningful to see how much improvement could have be seen with my new training philosophy...

so we go .... I started very conservatively and I was not better than 30th after 1 or 2k. Then little by little I started to pick-up runners ... the HR climbed to the low 180s and was quite steady. By half race I was in the top 10 and still feeling ok. With 3k to go, I reached a pair who was in 6th,7th place, while the leading group of 4 was definitely too far ahead. I actually started to pay the effort and the stride was a bit heavier than before. So I hang on with them, until the final 500m "climbing" the overpass were an all-out sprint among us, but I was with no more kick and settled for 8th overall (2nd Master) with a gun time of 34'02".
I really gave it all in the final 100m to stay under 34' but legs were really too heavy ...

• 1'35" improvement in 52 weeks,
• my new PB on 10k,
• achieved my target to stay in the low 34' and be in the Top 10 overall ...

WOW! Well done!

I went home with a pair of Nike Katana Racer and 100USD Nike voucher, so it was really a good occasion to celebrate with a huge lunch with the family.

I raced at 3'24" pace and basically I never trained at that speed : the validity of the "aerobic" approach to Road Running is in my opinion undisputed. On a faster course and cooler weather, I guess I could have done 10sec better (just my new personal target ...)

Now some images:
here a gorgeous view of the runners after 500m (I am very well behind still) ===>










This is a brutal picture of sheer suffering on the final sprint













but if you want to see more, click on this fantastic photo album with many nice pictures of the race (you can see a guy chatting at 18km/hr .... that's me)


Total weekly count:
Car: 883Km (551 Miles)
Run: 85Km (54 miles) (no long run ...)