How to finish the second but win a 5km race? Letterenloop 2017
Disclaimer: Automatically translated from Russian
Ok, I’ll temporarily skip the Wings for Life World Run report and try to write very briefly about Letterenloop that happened last weekend (especially since this was not in my Instagram, which I scored for a month ago).
So, for a couple of months I have been living without a training plan: I just run 5 times a week at different rates and with different volumes from 55 to 75 km per week, but on Tuesdays, as a bayonet, I come to the KAV Holland training, where we do physical education and run all kinds of intervals at a target pace of 10 and 5 km. With the target pace of the top ten, everything is clear to me, but with the five it’s more difficult. Since I have never run this distance, at random I chose the pace of 3:35 min / km and try to stick to it. It seems to be, but I wanted to check if I could stand it in combat conditions. To this end, I actually signed up for Letterenloop. Well, the child was again recorded this year for a kilometer and a half, so you still had to be there.
A couple of days before the event, I ran along the route, studied the track more closely. As a program, I wanted to run the maximum at an average rate of 3:35 / km, the fallback is 18:22 ( on DD ), which corresponds to a rate of 3:40 / km. Since this is my first race at this distance, in any case I counted on a personal record. There was no chance of prize places - in previous years, the average rate of the winners was somewhere around 3: 10 / km. Oh well.
The race was held at Haarlem and Bloemendaal, with the start and finish at the rink. We arrived at the start, received numbers. A bathhouse began on the street - about + 24 degrees. Just finished running 10 km - all had tortured faces. He began to watch who would run in my race. Immediately saw Johan Neve, who is 2 times older than me, but God forbid everyone runs. Also noticed a familiar face - Niels Fleet, who trains in our time at our stadium, but in another Stijn Jaspers Running Team club, where animals are prepared for short and medium distances, sometimes with barriers. There were no more acquaintances (many fled exactly a dozen on this day).
Getting ready to start. Johan, Niels and another 5 people immediately stand in the first row. I try to stand next to me, but they don’t let me in - they say that my number is wrong, without a special sticker. To get it, you need to select a competitive category when registering and indicate the club and your membership number. I didn’t have a license at the time of registration for the race. Okay, I think I’m running from the second ranks, there’s not much for the people anyway. And here between us they launch teams from organizations, a little, 5 pieces, but this is 25 people, all multi-caliber and stand very tight. Pancake.
Shot, ran. Started inside the rink along the track. During this turn (meter 150), I managed to run around all the teams and sit in the head of the train, behind some petty guy. Niels ran ahead, followed by Johan and the kid and I. After 300 meters, the guy fell off, I caught up with Johan, and Niels, meanwhile, continued to run ahead. With Johan, we ran around 2 km, after which I overtook him. At around 2.3 km after a short climb, Niels was briefly overtaken:
But three hundreds meters later, he again walked around me and began to increase speed. 500 meters to the finish line, it seemed to me that he began to give up a little and slow down, I got a little closer, but no - it seemed. At the final turn, I again lagged behind a little and finished with a lag of a few seconds:
After the finish line, a badge with the number 2 was immediately hung on me and told me not to go anywhere. Some woman ( as it later turned out from the newspaper Haarlems Dagblad ) asked who I was and why I came to her land, how I liked the track and separately asked how I liked the hills. She wrote everything in a notebook and let go.
About half an hour later they called to the nightstand. Near her stood a girl who did not let me into the starting zone. Looks, they say, are you trying to crawl again? I show on the badge and on the nightstand. Surprised and missed. One of the prize handlers asks where I come from. From Russia, I say. Oh, probably, I ran for a long time. 5 years, I say:
Niels got the cup, and Johan and I got books and a gift certificate to the bookstore. Well, then the children’s race began, after which we left without watching the official results.
In the evening I looked at the protocols, and it turned out that I even managed to win this race, overtaking the winner by exactly 1 second (start 6 seconds later, but during the race I played this time):
Eh, I didn’t get the cup, but even though they wrote in the newspaper and in historical protocols I will now appear as a winner. Well, of course, just lucky - it’s lucky that the treadmill comrades chose to run the top ten, and Johan won the country championship among the masters the day before and was a little tired, and so I would show us all where the crayfish hibernate.