The Fastest!

It's been hard this weekend to escape the concept of running faster... in case you missed it, yesterday Eliud Kipchoge ran a marathon in 1:59:40.2.

It's the fastest marathon ever, the first time the magical barrier of two hours had been broken. 

It seemed impossible; most people thought it was.

But Kipchoge and the team working with him devoted everything they had toto the goal. Drawing on the input of experts in technology, sports science, psychology. nutrition and biomechanics, nothing was left to chance.

And he did it. 

1:59:40.2.

It was definitely an inspirational performance - which I watched in part on Kirsten's phone before and during parkrun yesterday. 

As we set off for parkrun, Kipchoge was entering the last couple of miles. As I passed the volunteers by the start/finish of my first little lap, I got a thumbs up from the gathered group, cheering on the parkrunners but also huddled around the phone. Kipchoge was still on target, just a couple of minutes to go now.

By the time I passed by again, the message came through clearly. The record had been broken. 

Sub 2-hours for the marathon was no longer impossible. It had become a reality. All the effort, the hard work, the planning and the dedication had paid off. Kipchoge had achieved his dream.

I still had just over a mile to go for my parkrun at this moment... and I was on target for a fastest of my own.

Over the last few years, fastest has not been high on my list of running priorities. I've definitely invested in achieving the goal of furthest, completing four ultra marathons since 2016, and sometimes by goals have been much simpler; thankful just to be able to run.

But now, fastest has definitely come back into my thinking. 

A few weeks ago, I broke 29 minutes at Hanley parkrun for the first time in almost a year. It followed my fastest 10k in over 3 years. Last week, I set some personal bests on Strava segments and ran my fastest mile of the year.

But running faster over recent weeks has not happened by accident - thinking about faster means doing things differently. My diet has improved. I've lost some weight. I've been including interval sessions in my training and added some cross-training to my weekly plans as well.

So when I completed my 200th Hanley parkrun yesterday, I was really pleased with the results. My time of 27:43 was my fastest at Hanley parkrun since 2014 (before I was even on Strava).

Can  I go faster? Or even achieve my fastest time over 5k, 10k, half marathon or marathon?

The hard work and focus continues.

Let's see what happens.

#nohumanislimited

PS just found out that Brigid Kosgei has broken the women's world marathon record today as well... 2:14:04 in Chicago. A truly fabulous achievement - even more inspiration now.