Corra again

A week has gone by already and it's back to Corra again. The marathon training plan for today is 1h15 at 70-80% of max HR, which I interpret as an easy run around to the lake and back. I arrange with Nico to go at 8:15 so that we can get back in time for the rugby.

I meet nico as planned and his marathon training plan is the same except it is to be run at 80% of max HR. So we already have a slightly different perspective on the run in view. I follow Nico from the start and whereas I'm normally the one who shoots off and sets the pace, today it's definitely Nico who has taken the matter in hand.

We set off relatively suickly through town and then into the forest and then the pace starts to hurt slightly. It's not as though we're flat out but I'm definitely outside of my comfort zone and would be happier running more slowly. I look at the Garminas it beeps for the third kilometre now: 3:52. Alright, we're running downhill and the going is still not too hard but surely Nico can't mean to keep this pace up for the whole of the way around the course?

We both agreed that we were well over 80% max HR at this pace and we slowed down. This lasted until we hit the wide forest track on the other side of the road and we sped up again. So basically our efforts to reduce the pace lasted for some 600m or so. We accelerated again and we were at 3:57 pace again before we upped the pace further to 3:53 and then stayed there. The conversation between us at this point was very limited. There's not much you can say when you're trying to catch your breath with every stride and I was just concentrating on keeping the rhythm. Nico asked if I could keep this up until the end adn I just replied that I'd try and we'd see.

Despite the effort, I was also pleased with our progress as compared to the record-breaking run we did last with Jean-Marc and Nico, I felt infinitely better and I knew that these are the signs of my improvement recently. The slope up to Pavillon de la Muette went by well and although the pace slowed to 4:05 for the kilometre uphill, we hit 3:55 again for the kilometre straight after. The gap between Nico and myself was far smaller in terms of performance too. On this run in the past, I've felt that he'd slowed for me so as not to gap me whereas now, I was able to pull him in and when he left me on the second uphill section, there was only a few metres between us.

I could see that we would beat the course record now with only 3 kilometres to go and I held on with all the remaining strength that I could muster. We hit town and it was a relief to feel the tarmac under my feet again and we made a final acceleration to 3:36 pace to finish the loop in 59:26, a new PB. Average speed over the course 4:00 per km or 15km/h. Really stonked with this result as was Nico. It's just a shame that the England boys couldn't pull off the same level of result in the rugby match afterwards.