The fundamental purpose of this style of meet is to give athletes as great a chance of achieving personal best and seasons best times as possible. To do this, athletes are seeded into paced races with others of similar ability. Overall there were 12 heats with between 12 and 15 runners battling it out for a good finishing position and fast times. Across the heats winners times ranged from 8.18 to 10.59. Incorporated into the day was the Scottish Championships for 3000m.
Each 3000m race, consisting of 15 laps of the 200m track had a designated pace maker who ran each lap to the pace of the target time of each heat. The quicker athletes (or less experienced) would hang in behind the pace maker while the rest of the field would string out behind and hang in for a gruelling 15 laps of running at their limits.
The 3000m is run almost entirely at Vo2 max pace, in other words as fast as your engine can go over the distance. I can only describe the experience as setting fire to my lungs whilst simultaneously maintaining strength of mind to keep myself balanced on a rivet of self-flagellation to maintain the pace I set off with.
My heat, one race before Martin's, was paced at 9.15, or 37 seconds per lap, or 4.57 per mile. Whichever way I viewed the numbers, the pace, be it by lap or mile, was certainly not within my reach at this time. To that end, once the starters gun sounded I swiftly drifted down the first bend to the back of the strung out field of 12. The plan being to save myself getting sucked into a group running at pace beyond my means. I cowered patiently at the back for the first 800m. Passing through the half mile in 2.33, albeit at the back, the pace was still very quick. Fortunately from here on I began steadily moving through the field taking confidence on passing each runner, I drove on as best I could. From around 1200m the race was something of a blur where I only recall subconsciously slacking off slightly when the pain was getting too much and I lost a place to a runner that came from behind. Pressing onto the finish that thankfully came sooner rather than later, I arrived in 6th place in 9.42.89. (A new PB, however only my second attempt at the distance, previously ran on outdoor track.)
Martin, a proven veteran at the 3000-meter race was seeded into a 15-man race paced for 9.45. Martin has enjoyed much previous success at the Scottish Championships for his age group, with numerous medals at V45 and V40. If Martin was fancying his chances at a V50 medal after 3 years away from the event, he certainly didn’t mention it to me as we were warming up together. Martin's race was paced more closely to his abilities than mine had been. This meant he could place himself into the middle of the field around his rivals who shared his age category. Watching Martin's race he was running almost a perfect even pace, likely dictated by his experience. Sitting behind a group of 4 runners as the race ticked round each lap Martin appeared to be hanging on, reluctant to drive the pace to overtake, requiring running higher up the banks, he feared aggravating a dormant calf injury. On arriving at the finish Martin was tucked in just behind this group finishing in 7th place and within 2 seconds of the 3 runners ahead of him. His finish time of 9.53.40 was good enough to add another medal to Martin's collection. He picked up a bronze medal in the V50 age group.
Thanks to our travelling support of Sandy, Billy, Jean and Mandy who could be heard above the crowd on each pass of the stand!
It was a great day's racing and an excellent way to test your ability to push yourself as far beyond the red line limiter of your bodies’ physiological frontier, as you dare!
Andy B
1 comment:
Well done Martin. You'll need a bigger trophy cabinet soon.
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