10 July 2008

Security flaw

It has been worrying me for a while, but luckily somebody else has spotted the problem and the biggest IT companies in the world are now working together to solve the flaw in internet security.

I now realise that it must have been these niggling worries that have prevented me from running faster than I ought to of late. I set out at 7:00 am this morning into a world gifted with a beautiful blue sky and little or no wind to complain about. My running cap was pulled down low over my head so as my eyes were not too dazzled by the bright sunlight so shortly after having woken up. My head was clear and my legs started running at a moderate pace.

It was the usual 11 km route today and I managed the first 2km in 8:40. Although this is not exactly fast, it was a 20 second improvement on Tuesday's time and I felt good about it. The pace had thus been set and the rest of the run went accordingly. I left the park in 28:00 exactly after 6.5 km so I knew that I was slower than last week but I felt comfortable and wasn't pushing it. I didn't look at my watch until getting back home from then on. I managed the course in 47:25 today so 4:16 per kilometre. I calculated that if I want to achieve my goal of running a marathon in under 3 hours then I will need to maintain this pace for 42.2 km and even then I still need to find another 18 seconds for the sprint finish !

I have been discussing marathons with Laurence quite frequently recently. We have decided to enter the Yvelines marathon at the end of October this year. this leaves a little time to prepare for the event and I'll do better than for Paris by setting up a true marathon training schedule prior to the event. Laurence wants to achieve a time under 4 hours which I think she's perfectly capable of, given the appropriate training.

P.S. I don't really worry about internet security, but I haven't found any other satisfactory reason to explain my performances recently.

2 comments:

Nick Wiechers said...

I worry about internet security. It doesn't affect my performances but it does mean I have to miss training from time to time. Not the same issue but, I nearly had an impromtu trip to Holland to our DR site as thieves in the UK took out one of our data centres by stealing copper cables from a point of presence. Bleedin copper for scrap!!! Way back wen I wer a lad, thieves used to rob banks and things. We fixed it in the end but I missed training again.

I suspect your lack of form is end of season blues. You should probably stop running for a week or two and do some cycling instead to allow the running muscles some time to recover. Have a good holiday if I don't see you before.

James said...

Thanks Nick.
Laurence told me about your trip to the airport and back !!
With the price of raw materials soaring, copper is now worth stealing.
Don't fancy resting over the Summer as I want to be on top form for when the season starts up in the Autumn. Scared that if I take a break I won't get back into running for a while. Have a good holiday yourselves.