Note
Reflecting on Batona-500
I knew that I am not ready to win A-meet before signing up for Batona-500 yet. My primary goal was to see if I am making any progress regarding my training. I ran four races this weekend with mixed results.
Physically I am on the right track. I was able to finish all races without having feeling that I am running out of gas at the end.
Technical performance could have been better, especially for Middle and Long courses. I could have been in top-10 easy if I was more consistent. I love my new compass but I have noticed that I tend to falter when taking bearings. Also I tend to misread contours – when I expect to see hilltop it is depression.
I did lot better on both sprints (except #7 on Sprint-A). Even I placed 4th in Sprint-B I loved the feeling I had during Sprint-A execution until #7… It was an easy course of course but flags were not visible from the directions I was coming from (except #3). But I could see location way ahead and I was planning my next leg even before seeing flag.
Since I messed up #7 on Sprint-A I think I was little bit more careful on Sprint-B, especially when going for #9, #10 and #11. I knew that this could be decent race for me and I did not wanted to mess it up.
Overall conclusion – I am on the right track. Sure I wanted to be higher then 20th in the Middle distance and 17th in the Long however maybe this is for the best in long term since I still have work cut out for me if I ever want to contend for top. Since it was not as successful as I hoped I feel highly motivated to practice even harder before next season starts.
Running 1:04:27 [4] 9.0 mi (7:10 / mi)
shoes: Adidas adiPRENE
ORD Tuesday sub-group at MCC
2 miles - 15:44 - Rob and I
2 miles - 13:56 - Rob and I, Mike joined at the end
2 miles - 13:24 - Mike and I
2 miles - 13:04 - Mike and I till about 0.8 miles to go - i finished ahead of Mike
1 mile - 8:17 - cooldown with Mike