27 April 2008

JP Morgan Corporate Challenge 2008

An okay for week with two quality sessions: a 5.4k road race (JP Morgan Corp Challenge) and a long run in the weekend.

The JP Morgan Corporate Challenge was advertised as 5.6k but the distance turned out to be a bit short according to my Garmin and other runners who wore Polar footpod. The race was a charity event and attracted around 12,000 office people who ran, jogged, and walked the course in the CBD.

After 2.7k warm up, I went to the start line at 5:30 and it was packed already. Managed to bump some people and stood about 5 meters away from the start. Was squeezed in the waiting pack for a long 30mins. Weather was overcast and good. At 6:00 pm the race started. Km 1 was very crowded with runners, both fast and slow zoomed like there was no tomorrow. I had to zig zag left and right to pass people (split 3:51). Km 2 was still crowded and I wasn't feeling that comfortable at this point, perhaps the body was still adjusting to the pace (split 3:52). The turnaround was at 2.4k, the lane now became clear. Felt much better encouraged by office colleagues who saw me running as we ran past Singapore Flyer (split 3:51). Km 4 was uneventful as we ran back towards Padang (split 3:52). I had a side stitch in the next km and had to slow down a bit to get the breathing right in order to get rid of the stitch. Also lost a couple of seconds as I overan the Espalanade turn (split 3:56). Passed the 5k mark in 19:24 and I tried to save my energy in order to kick in the last 200m. But after a couple hundred meters I alrady saw the finish banner, so the course was slower than I thought. Saw the clock 20:4xx and sprinted to finish in 20:54.

In general, I was reasonably happy with the run given the fitness shape that I am in. I think I could have run it a bit faster.

The rest of the week were all easy, short runs except a 20k long run with a 8k tempo in the middle on Sunday.

Monday (concrete) :
35 mins Easy (av 5:24) incl 6 x 00:25 strides on grass

Tuesday (treadmill) :
40 mins Easy (av 5:19)

Wednesday (road race):
2.7k warm up
5.4k race in 20:54
4.0k cool down

Thursday:
AM: 20 mins Recovery (av 6:13) on grass
PM: 30 mins Elliptical

Friday (concrete/treadmill):
AM: 40 mins Easy (av 5:20, av HR 143 bpm)
PM: 20 mins Easy of hills on treadmill, 1.5-7.0% grade (av 5:18)

Saturday (concrete):
45 mins Easy (av 5:10, av HR 145)

Sunday (bike path):
20k Long Run in ~1h:38m (av 4:56) incl 8k tempo @ 4:22 min/km (av HR 170)

Total 70k for the week, 245k for the month, 1113k for the year

2 comments:

Clown said...

Widi, good effort and nice pace, not that much slower than in Perth. Seems as though you have found the spark you need to get you fired up again.

Epi said...

Nice race Widi. Seems the shorter stuff you can still do in the heat and humidity without losing too much performance.