Completed in 1 hour 59 min 10 secs, pace of 5 min 38 secs. Only improved by 17 secs from my PB during the Blackmores Half Marathon in 2010. Gutted but at least there's that improvement. Was putting quite a bit of effort in April to train for it but then I suffered from a groin injury which took longer than expected to recover and didn't get to train how I wanted. This was only 37 secs faster when I ran with a sprained ankle last year. Another reason to feel gutted. Gosh! I must have been really fit back then and mentally much stronger.
Today I ran without my RunKeeper as my phone dropped into the pool few days ago and am still waiting for a new battery. I resorted back to the good ol' watch. Pace for the first 10km was once again awesome, clocking a time of 52:26, at a pace of 5 min 14 secs. But after that, it all went downhill. I was both physically and mentally weak and the mind definitely played a huge role today. Felt like stopping so many times and it was asking the legs not to go so fast. Stopped once to stretch when I actually didn't need to and did the most disappointing thing - walked up the last hill, which I have been telling myself not to do so over the past few weeks. Again, I found every opportunity at the water stations to rest.
The route had more slopes than I expected. But I am not blaming that. I am blaming myself, for being weak in the head. Yes, I am also physically not in the best condition in this run - groin injury, sore throat and a flu that I got last night... But I still feel the weak mind contributed a lot. Been telling myself to stay strong but I was defeated today. Yes, there is a tiny bit of improvement, but I actually thought I was better than this. Training for the full marathon will commence soon. It's been awhile since I did a run and felt proud of myself. I think after the full marathon in October, I am sticking to 10km runs only :p
This run have definitely made me face the fact that I am so not a long distance runner. And have also realized I need to start watching what I eat .... damn old age!
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