This was my first race after running the Routeburn Classic, and I was looking forward to getting my legs moving again after having had a couple of weeks of forced down time. The rain that had been forecast held at bay, and the morning was cool and pleasant for running. I had debated trying for a personal best and consequently whether or not to carry my Cambelbak, deciding to go hard and run light. All suited and booted and traveling on the bus to the start, I realised that I has left my GPS watch on the passenger seat in my car! Damn! How was I going to pace myself now?
The race started at the Fielding train station. A fair crowd of runners milled about in the cool morning, and despite a distinct lack of race-number-safety-pins, everything was well organized and coordinated. At 9:30 we all set off, the course mostly followed long straight sections of road between Fielding and Palmy. I was unsure of pacing myself, but decided to go with what felt good, while pushing myself, and decided that without my watch I would probably be a bit slower. The kilometers flew by and it was nice to get the chance to enjoy some of the countryside while I trotted along.
After passing through Bunnythorpe, the road started to undulate a bit, and I really enjoyed springing up the little hills for a few km. The descent over the final hill bought me into Palmerston North itself, and the course followed the streets for a while, before joining the river-side walk way. I kept my fueling up during the run, trying to spread my gels and chomps out, but never letting my blood sugar get too low. This approach kept me ticking along quite nicely. By the time I was heading a long the river section there was less than 5km till the finish. I had no idea how long I had been going for, any my quads were really starting to burn. I don't know why they were so sore, but it was probably a combination of not doing much running during the previous fortnight, and them also being a bit tender from interval training two days prior to racing. I tried to keep my head down, and keep my pace on. With only a couple of kilometers to go, the course headed back onto the streets in the lovely tree-lined suburb of Hokowhitu. As I approached the finish, I pushed harder, hoping that my time would be reasonable. I crossed the finish line in 2:02:36, which was about a minute slower than my personal best. I was impressed that I had managed to pace myself quite successfully without my watch.
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