Oh, great; a winter run!

Today was my first race of the year. My first run of the year, to be honest because a chesty cold kept me away from my running shoes until now. And it was great. But it was cold. Like really, really cold. But then, it was the Great Winter Run, so I wasn’t exactly expecting a heatwave! And in fairness, it didn’t seem too terribly cold once I started running.

The race was a wee 5K around Holyrood Park. And I admit to feeling a bit cocky when I first registered because it was “just” a wee 5K. Only what I hadn’t appreciated was that it was a 5K that included a long, 3K-long uphill start. A long, long, long 3K-long really steep uphill start!

Add that to my way-too-fast starting pace, a lack of pre-race running, and my post-chest-cold breathing problems and you’ve got the perfect conditions for a slow, slow run. And so, I found myself walking for bits of the long, daunting hill.

Thankfully the last 2K were mostly downhill. And that was better for my chest. And for my legs. And for my overall motivation. And that means that I did manage to catch up a bit of lost time. In fact, I ran the entire race with negative splits!

When I registered for the race, I was feeling healthy and I was getting a few small training runs in here-and-there. So I figured I would be able to manage a 27(or so)-minute race. But then I got sick and wasn’t able to get any training runs over the past couple of weeks. So I amended my goal to a sub-33-minute race.

In the end, I crossed the finish line with a time of 31.33. Not totally awesome, but not bad. Not bad at all.

I will need to step up my training game over the next few weeks so that I’m ready for the first of many half marathons I plan to run this year. After all, I have a goal and I won’t beat that goal if I don’t get some training in. Lots and lots of training. But I can do it!

As always, you can see more photos from this and other races here.