Sunday morning, we're back in the Alps after a lovely week in Venice. The weather is distinctly cooler here as firstly, we're now at 850m altitude and secondly, last night's thunderstorm has cleared the air wonderfully.
It had stopped raining by the time I had decided to go for my run. As it's Sunday and I hadn't been running for the last 2 days, I decided to go for a longer run and run up the col closest to Onnion and the holiday centre where we're staying, Les Chavannes. I rembered having run this course last year and estimated that the total distance was somewhere between 18 and 20 kilometres.
It was one of those days, I discovered as soon as I set out, that everything felt good. I set off at a reasonable pace up the hill towards Megevette and the temperature was ideal. The sun was hiding behind a veil of clouds and every now and then it would appear and the rain lying on the road would rise in a haze of steam. My Garmin was playing up over the first 3 km as it recorded my times as 4:02, 4:17 and 3:58. I estimated that my actual pace was around 4:35 which was still good going up the hill. I reached the plateau at Megevette and turned right at the church to take the road parallel to the main road along the side of the valley. At the end of this road, I rejoined the main road and carried on up to the top of the col. I was still progressing steadily with my slowest kilometre up the hill at 5:10. I felt really good and was happy to be out of the heat of Venice and running again at a good pace. All was not lost !
I ran into Jambaz at the top of the hill and then turned back and started running straight down again. Again, a good steady pace, relaxing my legs and letting gravity take me down as fast as possible. The next 3 kilometres went by quickly: 3:49, 3:50 then 3:55. I was thinking to myself that this was fast going and then realising that I still wasn't at 10 km race pace. I hit the plateau at Megevette and slowed down slightly, returning along the side road. But even on this flatter section of the course I still maintained a pace of 4:09 then 4:21 before increasing my speed again to over 15 km/h.
I got back to Les Chavannes in 1:20:43 with 19 km showing on the Garmin. Even taking into account the tricks the Garmin played on me over the first 3 km, I reckon that the distance was more likely 18.5 km but this was still an excellent performance. I compared this to my run over a slightly shorter course up to Col de Jambaz last year, when I ran 1:24:02. So, an overall improvement of around 4 minutes when I take into account the extra distance. Very pleased.
Garmin says I averaged the course at 4:14 per km, so marathon pace including 300m of ascension, which is pretty good going.
It had stopped raining by the time I had decided to go for my run. As it's Sunday and I hadn't been running for the last 2 days, I decided to go for a longer run and run up the col closest to Onnion and the holiday centre where we're staying, Les Chavannes. I rembered having run this course last year and estimated that the total distance was somewhere between 18 and 20 kilometres.
It was one of those days, I discovered as soon as I set out, that everything felt good. I set off at a reasonable pace up the hill towards Megevette and the temperature was ideal. The sun was hiding behind a veil of clouds and every now and then it would appear and the rain lying on the road would rise in a haze of steam. My Garmin was playing up over the first 3 km as it recorded my times as 4:02, 4:17 and 3:58. I estimated that my actual pace was around 4:35 which was still good going up the hill. I reached the plateau at Megevette and turned right at the church to take the road parallel to the main road along the side of the valley. At the end of this road, I rejoined the main road and carried on up to the top of the col. I was still progressing steadily with my slowest kilometre up the hill at 5:10. I felt really good and was happy to be out of the heat of Venice and running again at a good pace. All was not lost !
I ran into Jambaz at the top of the hill and then turned back and started running straight down again. Again, a good steady pace, relaxing my legs and letting gravity take me down as fast as possible. The next 3 kilometres went by quickly: 3:49, 3:50 then 3:55. I was thinking to myself that this was fast going and then realising that I still wasn't at 10 km race pace. I hit the plateau at Megevette and slowed down slightly, returning along the side road. But even on this flatter section of the course I still maintained a pace of 4:09 then 4:21 before increasing my speed again to over 15 km/h.
I got back to Les Chavannes in 1:20:43 with 19 km showing on the Garmin. Even taking into account the tricks the Garmin played on me over the first 3 km, I reckon that the distance was more likely 18.5 km but this was still an excellent performance. I compared this to my run over a slightly shorter course up to Col de Jambaz last year, when I ran 1:24:02. So, an overall improvement of around 4 minutes when I take into account the extra distance. Very pleased.
Garmin says I averaged the course at 4:14 per km, so marathon pace including 300m of ascension, which is pretty good going.
Col de Jambaz in the Winter. Obviously, there was less snow when I was at the top this morning. View is the same otherwise.
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