Yesterday I ran my second Sutherland to Surf, we had a great day and I achieved my goal time.
Prep started on Saturday evening. I planned what I was going to wear, made sure it was clean and made what is becoming my go to pre race carb loading dinner. Pasta, chunks of sausage, vegetables and tomato sauce. Its quick and easy, tasty, easy to knock together if you are staying away from home and something that most people will happily eat.
Sunday morning we woke at 6:30am and ate 'breakfast of champions' - porridge, banana, a little honey and some chia and sunflower seeds.
One of Michael Cleases friends came round and we drove to the race, collecting another friend on the way.
It was cold! We only arrived about 10mins before the start but even then our hands were going numb.
A common complaint for the Sutho to surf is that there is no encouragement to self seed, it means some of the walkers and slower runners end up near the front and some of the faster runners nearer the back, like me! I don't really have a problem with this as I feel the dodging between people is quite a distraction and makes things a little more interesting but I can understand that it is considered by many to be a safety concern.
We agreed before the race that we not try and stay together so about 50metres in Michael Clease and I took off a little faster. Its fairly down hill at the beginning and pretty fun.
After about 3km Michael Clease was pulling ahead, looking round occasionally but it became clear that he'd be going faster and so he took off into the crowd.
I think there were three water stations in total, I only stopped at one. It wasn't very warm so it wasn't an issue. I kept an eye on my watch. I knew I had to do each km faster than 6minutes if I was to achieve my goal of under 1 hour, 5:23 to be exact. I was going pretty well for the first half but into the second the hills seemed to get bigger and my time slowed a little.
Into around 9km there is a big down hill followed by a flat, both times i've done this race I've under estimated the big up hill into the finish. I'm pleased to say I managed to keep quite a steady pace and then a fast finish.
I finished in 56:57mins, Michael Clease finished in 54:17. I'm still a way off the fastest females time of 37:52 but very happy to have finished in the top 12% of female entrants and top 25% of all entrants.
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| (I started it a little while before we crossed the start line hence the slow beginning) |
