Choose Your Own Adventure!

Training and racing in another half marathon isn’t quite what it used to be – even though I set a goal of wanting to break through a personal best time of 1.32.02 and the intention was to be quicker than 90 minutes this time around.

So why do another half marathon race?.. Well for starters I convinced one of my original training partners to fly into the Adelaide and do it together with me – it was going to be a bit of a stretch for him as he and his wife had spent the last three months renovating and building a property – so he wouldn’t have much time for training, although it would give him the opportunity to put something into the diary and be a stretch goal.

In life we always need motivation and while we’re taking care of business and family, often our own personal fitness needs go by the way side. So this was it – having a fitness goal far enough away in the distance (three or so months) – was enough to get him training and looking forward to the race.

The race itself is always a celebration – it’s the culmination of the efforts beforehand and on the day – anything can happen.

Generally in a run race – not much can go wrong unless the individual hasn’t done the necessary training. And weather is what it is – rain, hail or shine – we can still run and if anything a bit of rain is great to cool things down. Too hot isn’t great for racing at all.

For me – I’d approached it slightly differently this time – along my ironman training, I’d gone along to another run group which had given me faster people to chase and had a different structure to their run schedule. Previously I’d only had either intervals training or long easy runs on the weekend.

This group incorporated tempo running on one of the days – so for example these would be longer distances done at pace – 2kms or more and intervals of those.

However as much as I wanted to get this 90min PB for a half marathon, unfortunately I got a bit unwell on my way back from our overseas trip a month ago and my recovery took time out of the training regime. I wasn’t sure how much it would impact the race and I was about to find out.

The race takes place in a beautiful part of south Australia – it’s one of the wine regions, so the roads are in the middle of grapevines and rolling hills (I was hoping for not too rolling) – but still the scenery was going to be great, so that was a given.

It’s also quite open – so wind was going to be another factor to consider. All in all – it was a great chance to challenge myself and get to that previously unfathomable goal of cracking the 90 minutes mark.

A bunch of friends were also going to be running – some supporting others and some racing for themselves. My friend was originally planning to run for himself, but through the run, he changed his mind and decided to focus on the runners around him and helping them complete their run.

When I met him at the end of the race – he exclaimed that this was the most fun he’s ever had in a race. What an incredible turnaround!

He could’ve focused on his lack of training and been disappointed at the completion of it for a whole range of reasons, but instead had the best time ever. One of the runners he ran with told him at the finish line that if it wasn’t for him – then she probably wouldn’t have finished. Yet she completed it and got a nearly 10 minute personal best result.

It’s a fascinating distinction that when we focus on contribution and what we can do for others – we get so much back, probably even beyond the feeling of fulfilment what we could’ve got for ourselves.

And for me – well I did get a 37 second PB result – so finished the half marathon with a time of 1.31.27 and the 90 minute mark will have to wait for another race down the track. I felt all the feelings of dealing with an expectation and not quite reaching it – so as usual a mixture of relief, elation and disappointment all at once.

But maybe one day, I’ll give it a go of having a race where I focus on helping others succeed.

Stan Zaslavsky