Clarke Quay 20 Run

Entered a small, low key race this morning, with the start point located about 1.5k from home. The event is called Clarke Quay 20, organized by Singaore Polytechnics School as part of the Singapore River Raft Race held in the weekend.

No taper, ran 62k total between Monday-Saturday and had no off days in the last three weeks. My aim was simply to get a feel of running at around 10k pace for a reasonable distance before a 10k race in 2 weeks time.

The run was supposed to start at 8:15, but was delayed until about 9am due to poor organisation. By that time, the sun was already out in full force. The route started at Clarke Quay MRT towards Fullerton Hotel, cross Coleman Bridge and back to Clarke Quay MRT via Read Bridge which included steep stairs. Two laps plus a final home stretch to UOB Building. There were only 25 runners in the male category, all college students, mostly less than half my age. The top 3 wins cash.

Started with the lead pack and after around 1k, there were only four of us. At the 2k mark, the top 2 broke away and left us about 50m behind. Was running neck by neck with the 3rd runner, and he was a total dickhead. He had no sportmanship and tried to block me all the time. When I ran on the right side and tried to pass him, he moved to the right, when I tried to pass from the left, he moved to the left and blocked me. He was struggling and dying, and I guess the only way he could get 3rd place is simply to stop and block peole from passing.

At km 3, I decided to have enough and bumped him at the shoulder and yelled 'Ran straight!'. He was dying and a minute later decided to walk as he had no hope of finishing 3rd. From then on, I ran alone with the the top 2 around 200-300m in front. My HR went to around 188 bpm at the 4k mark and I then decided to relax the pace a bit since 3rd place was safe.

Finished 3rd place, 1 min after the winner and 3mins before the 4th runner. Won $100 cheque (US$75)

Splits: 3:34/168, 3:49/176, 3:50/182, 3:50/187, 3:58/188 and 1:52 for the last 470m. Total distance was 5.47k including 2 sets of stairs.

Anyway, my training for this week:

Monday (road):
92 mins Long Run (av pace 5:01, av HR 150 bpm)

Didn't enjoy the run. It seems that my recent venture into speed training makes fat buring harder. Also mentally, track running is more motivating due to the need to concentrate to hit certain times. Last 3k at around Marathon Pace

Tuesday (treadmill):
35 mins Easy (av pace 5:19)
40 abs crunch

Wednesday (grass):
13 mins warm up incl 3 strides
2 x 15 mins Tempo (av 4:08) with 4 mins recovery
4 x 150m Repetitions in 00:30
12 mins cool down

Av HR was 162 bpm for the first tempo segment and 171 bpm for the second one. Really happy with the run as HR was relatively stable and didn't go through the roof.

Thursday (treadmill):
40 mins Recovery run (av 5:34)
5 mins stretching/core + 50 abs crunch

Friday (road):
50 mins Easy (av 5:02)
incl. 8 x (100m strides, 100 m jog) + 4 x 00:15 hill sprints
5 mins stretching/core

Saturday (concrete):
33 mins Recovery run (av 5:27)

Sunday (concrete):
3.6k warm up in segments (race kept gettng delayed)
~5.5k race in 20:56 (av 3:50) incl steps
1.2k slow cool down

3rd place overall, av HR 181, high HR 191. Won $100.

Total 72.3k for the week, 1398k for the year