MSF running and racing update

This is probably a week or so overdue. It’s been a couple of weeks since I ran my first race in this series – the National Cross Country Championships held at Roundhay Park in Leeds on 27 February. Without a doubt, it was the hardest race I’ve ever run in. For a start – there is a reason why it is called the NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS. These runners were good. Really. Good. And I am not really good. I am an average middle-of-the-pack runner, at best. And today was not my best. You have those days, and today was one of them.

As if 1400 of the country’s finest cross-country runners wasn’t intimidating enough, I also had the course to contend with. I was wearing very inappropriate trail shoes with minimal grip when I should have been wearing lighter 15mm spiked shoes like everyone else. So not only was I relatively inexperienced having only run trail races, I also had bad equipment to deal with the monstrous cloying mud, downhills and cambers we had to deal with in two laps of the course. Not that I am blaming my tools – I really was out of my league. Even if I had better shoes, I’d still have only finished in the last quartile of this tough 12km race rather than the last 100. Others were kind and said that usually this race would be run over 8km, but I really did struggle. The most disappointing thing was that I finished with gas in the tank enough to run over to the rest of the team and felt like running some more. I was very under prepared and that cost me. Anyway, all good experience for this relative novice runner.

The second race in the series happened today, and went much better. This was a 10km run in Regent’s Park, London at 9am run by the Friends of MSF, and is the event that inspired to embark on this path in the first place. Today was a good day – I was well-rested,  well-fed and up for the challenge. I ended up running a great time for me in my first 10km tarmac race. I’ve run a few trail 10k races now, but only 5k races on tarmac / road. I ran today’s 10km in 45 minutes and 44 seconds – which is a pace of just over 7 minutes per mile. I’ve never sustained that pace over this distance before – not even in training runs, so I was very pleased with my result.

When I got home, there was even better geek fun to be had. I worked out my age-graded time. This involves taking my advancing years and into account and it compares my time with the standards that others at my time of life would run this distance after performing some kind of statistical corrections. When I first started running, my times put me at around the 48-50th percentile of equivalent aged male runners. Today’s race put me over the 60th percentile for the first time – 61st percentile means that I am now classed as a ‘locally competitive runner’ (70th percentile = regionally competitive, 80th percentile = national calls, 90th percentile = international class).

As well as being personally fulfilling through all the training and racing I’m doing, I’m of course looking to raise funds for MSF. Today, the racers and their supporters / sponsors raised over £20,000 for MSF – which is fantastic.

A big thank you to all of you that have sponsored me so far in my series of races. For those of you that have meant to sponsor me but haven’t got round to it yet, can I encourage you to follow the link and make a donation as soon as you can? Every bit helps, no matter how small – and encourages me a lot when I’m running for a good 100 minutes at a time covering 20km+ on cold London nights and mornings at the moment.

Here’s the link again: www.justgiving.com/sarbjohal

Please feel free to pass the link on to others or ask me questions if you feel like it. My workplace – the Department of Health – are publishing a ‘health & well-being’ feature on my in their staff publication next month, so hopefully that will bring a few more donations in too. If you know anyone who can help with publicity, or have any ideas, I’d love to hear them.

As a final sign-off, I’m now running half-marathon distance in my training runs in about 1 hour 50-55 minutes, and I’ve also added a new race to my schedule – the Oxon 40/20 (I’m doing the 20 mile version). I’m planning on running it in 5 mile chunks and treating it as a training run – it’s a bit of an orienteering mission, so I’ll take food etc. If you fancy joining me, give me a shout.

Will leave it there for now. Be great to hear from you and see your encouraging words on my Facebook and group wall and the donation site.