Sunday, January 1, 2017

Hoping for the tide to turn..

An excellent 1:51/21.1K run on 31st December to end the 3rd consecutive year of injury plagued, below par running is hopefully an harbinger of the turning of the tide in 2017. After a low of just one FM in 2015, two FMs and the Bangalore Ultra in 2016 was an improvement.

Following is a summary of the year's events:

SCMM 2016  -  17th January - 3:47:15  versus goal of 3:50
Green Europe Marathon  - 8th May - 3:49:25 (original goal was 3:50, later changed to 3:45)
Bangalore marathon -  16th October  - DNS (goal of sub 3:45)
Kaveri Trail Marathon (HM) - 1:55:07
Bangalore Ultra (50 Km) -  5:58:38 - downgraded from 75Km with a goal to complete around 6hrs

After restarting structured RLRF training including the intervals in July after a break of over two years, things were going very well till the minor tear in the right calf muscle in September a few weeks before the Bangalore marathon set me back to ground zero. Consequently had to skip the Bangalore marathon , downgrade Bangalore Ultra to 50K and abandon plans to run Comrades in 2017. After about 5 weeks of rest, physiotherapy and strengthening  I managed a few tempo and long runs post the Bangalore Ultra.  Managed to keep the weight in the 54 to 56Kg range through the year.

The 2017 goal is to to stay injury free and work towards hitting BQ-5 at  SCMM in January 2018. I intend to continue to focus on strength training.  The only two races confirmed so far for 2017 are:
 a)  SCMM on 15th January ( sub 3:45) and
 b) HM at Auroville on 12th February ( sub 1:44)  

The other potential races are a FM in the east coast of US in May if the vacation plan works out , 12 hour stadium run on 30th July  and 50 Km at Malnad Ultra on 7th October. 

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