21 February 2009

pre-RUNew jitters

I'm scared of McKinley Hill. There, I've admitted it. Haha.

I was only able to run that route once, during our own UNICEF Walk on the Child's Side walk/fun run last November. And it was pretty memorable in the sense that I was 15 minutes late for the 10K run because I had to attend to some logistics at the UNICEF booth before running.

By the time I joined the race, the 10K runners were way ahead, and the 5K runners had left 10 minutes ago already. It was really a bad idea for me to run at that point, but McKinley looked so tempting I just had to try.

Around an hour later, I was gasping for breath as I staggered out of Heritage Park. If it weren't for my iPod, I would have been de-motivated and would have quit altogether. I wasn't really conditioned for 10K to begin with (it was only my second time to run that distance) and I had no idea how challenging the hilly portions were pala in that serene but deceivingly friendly park. My PR wasn't terribly bad in spite of my 'umble 1-month newbie status (7:40), but the route left me drained and feeling a little down about my performance.

So now that I'm facing McKinley Hill again tomorrow (this time only for a 5K), I'm a bit jittery. I had 3 practice runs this week in Legaspi Park but I still feel woefully unprepared. (To tell you the truth, I don't even have a formal training program to follow, and I just decide on the length of time for running on a very ad hoc basis.) Last Thursday, I ran at a moderate pace for 40 minutes for endurance purposes and covered around 6K, I think. And then yesterday, I did a short maintenance run for 25 minutes. Not sure how much distance I covered, but I ran at a faster pace than that of Power Run and went up and down the few hilly portions of Legaspi Park (they're just little grassy knolls, basically). Shucks, I really need to get myself an affordable GPS running watch soon in order to simply track my pace and distance.

Lord, I don't ask for much, and I'm not even expecting a sub 7 pace for this McKinley route--but at least please, please don't let me embarrass myself in tomorrow's run.

2 comments:

  1. don't worry too much!! just enjoy the run, gina! i'm sure you'll do well. :) DON'T WORRY!

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  2. I'm a worrier at heart. Haha! See you tomorrow then!

    ReplyDelete