Racing

So it is nearly raceday and time to commit to my goals. When you are feeling good in the run up to IM in my experience this is no guarantee of a good race... which leaves me with mixed feelings since I know that my bike is the strongest ever and that my run training has been solid if not spectacular.

I would like to feel that I can post a solid bike to put me in the zone for an AG place to Kona if I run a pb (and then some) in the marathon. Sometimes the 40-44 AG can be unforgiving.. they often seem to race faster than the younger AGers, see the results at yesterdays ITU European longcourse champs where the top4 AGers were 40-44!

So back to my goal which to work means I need to keep every run split at 5min/km or better and that is where the racing comes in. Hitherto I have only ever really aimed to meet a certain target or even just to complete. Will the concept of "racing" help or will it just mean I pace my race more poorly than normal and have a really bad split somewhere in the marathon. Well I believe I am fit enough to reach my target and have done (enough?) work to put me in the frame. So it will be time to use up the mental resource to push through that vital third quarter of the marathon and know that come the last 10km I will be racing for the finish and not just for the clock.