Looking back on 2010

I started this blog at the beginning of the year and if I remember correctly my one goal was completing the Death Race in August. Everything I did up to that was a planned slow progression leading up to that race and my primary goal of completing it. Well, I finished the Death Race in 22:44:27 so I guess I accomplished my goal.

As well this year I ran a half marathon, 2 marathons, 2 50k ultras, 1 50 mile ultra and 3 short cross country races. I even managed to place 3rd in my age group in the final standings of the local running associations cross country series (by default though because there were only three of us that ran enough of the races to qualify for the final points).

In February I increased my weekly running totals too quickly and injured my right leg, I believe the problem was a stress fracture on my fibula which put a damper on my running for much of March. Which lead to me running a local half marathon at the end of March when I was just barely comfortable enough to run again. I finished the race in 1:42:30, which is now my personal best but I feel I can do better as I hurt too much that day to put any kick in my race that day at all.

The beginning of May saw me take on a double back to back of a 50 km trail ultra on saturday May 1st and then the Vancouver marathon the next day on sunday. I did the 50 k in 4:47 and the marathon in 4:27. I viewed this double as a test to see how my endurance was. I'm not sure what I learned through this, other than not getting enough sleep before the second day wasn't a good idea. I could have run the 50 km in less than 4:30 possibly even less as I was purposely trying to hold back so I wasn't destroyed for the second race of the weekend. But even with holding back I totally hit a wall at the 30 km point in the marathon.

June was the scorched sole 50 mile race. Looking back on the race I think this was my best race all year. No injuries, no hydration issues, no cramping. Probably was helped by the fact that this race is on trails that I regularly train on. I so very much look forward to the 2011 race. I suppose one thing I should take from how easy this race seemed in relation to other races is that I need to prepare better for other races.

August long weekend was the Death Race. I really am happy that I finished this. The race itself was awesome and felt so good to be able to accomplish it, breathtaking scenery, super challenging hills. Yeah I made some mistakes on the run and I could probably do it faster if I were to do it again. But I probably won't do that race again.

I didn't do much running for a bit after the Death Race. It was rather hard to get inspired to run when I had just complete what was the one major goal of the year. So looking forward to this year I need to make sure I have a goal coming up soon after a real long race, even if its just to participate in a small race. I did a fair bit of biking to keep up my fitness. This lead to the 54 km Walk in the Park race on Labour day. I was running strong with the secondary group of runners and doing good but by the end of the race I had hurt my ankle somehow, and this injury lingered on until the Kelowna Marathon in October. I thought I had fully recovered as the week before the marathon I did a long run of 28 km without any pain. But apparently not. The marathon was a double loop of a half marathon course. I did the first half in 1:39, and then around the second half my ankle pain flared up like crazy and did a much slower second half split time of 2:15 for a total time of 3:55:46 which is still a personal best. But again, I think I can do better.

Overall for the year I ran 2035 km (1200 of those on the trails) and biked 1245 km (860 on the road bike, the rest on mountain bike). I only ran or biked 282 days of the year, meaning there was 75 days off. I feel like I could avoid injury better and train better if I were to run more often, that way when I hit long runs there is less likely to get injured, even if I am just adding in 5 km runs on the days I may have not run in the past.

All in all it was a good year for running. Next year I will spend more time on the trails than I did this year, and I will try and be more judicious about increasing my milage to avoid injury.