easy run in Regents Park. It was cold again and still windy, although the wind wasn't as strong as few days ago. My hands were freezing though, but it just seemed silly to wear gloves on the first day of Spring! I felt good, but ran slow for some reason, 56:22 (8:56 pace).
After about 5 miles I stopped at the track to do some strides. For some strange reason, I felt fast and decided to time 3rd and 4th. I got 18sec. for 99m on the 3rd and 17sec. for 90m on the 4th. It's too bad Garmin doesn't register tenths of a second, because 18 could have been 17.6 or 18.4, but was rounded up to 18. But I was shocked by how fast I felt - my turnover was very good, my knee lift was good and I felt real power to my stride. I was spending very little time on the ground and landing on the ball of my foot, like sprinters do :). It was all the more surprising, because I was wearing my heaviest shoes, Asics Nimbus, which are really not conducive to fast running.
On my jog back home I was trying to solve this puzzle why I felt so great doing sprints today, but couldn't come up with any explanation. But it made me think that perhaps I still have a little but of speed left at my advanced age, I just need to focus on bringing it back. Maybe I'll start focusing on 5K again after my marathon and doing more intervals.
Almost forgot: I watched British Eurosport channel's coverage of Seoul marathon. I was very inspired by Lee Bong-Ju. He ran incredibly gutsy race and never ever gave up. There was a big gap between him and Kirui starting from about 30K, and it grew to about 100 meters. At that point everyone was already tired, but Lee just held his own, and then somehow found the reserve to close the gap and pass Kirui, who as it turned out, had nothing left and was barely hanging on. When Lee passed him at like, 40K, Kirui gave him this mad look, but couldn't do anything. The gap looked insurmountable, and yet Lee found a way back in. Very very inspiring to watch. Just goes to prove that you should never give up and that your opponent might be hurting more than you are, even if he is in front at the moment. He had screaming and yelling fans all the way to the stadium that helped, I'm sure, but to win in such a way, especially at 36, when people pretty much wrote him off, is really awesome. He also ran the best time in the world this season, I think - 2:08:04. | 