Half-experienced

Last Sunday I finally finished a half-marathon race. My second attempt. That circumstance, finishing it, was my main goal. As a result of such accomplishment I could finally put an end to the mild feeling of disappointment (not even failure) I had after my first attempt back in 1994, in Toulouse, where I could only run half of it. A half-half-marathon. Big deal.

This time around I knew beforehand I was going to finish the race. As much as I also knew, as the writer had it, that at least I wasn't going to walk either. No matter what. My final time was 1h53m03s which is better than I had anticipated. In fact it could have been even better (around 1h45m) hadn't I suffered the injury of the gastrocnemius muscle of my right leg around kilometer 12. Two days after the event, as I write, the muscle seems already quite recovered. I know from previous experience that resting for about a week will suffice to get fully back to normal. These kind of injuries are pretty nasty. All of a sudden I noticed an accute sharp pain on my leg, as if some muscle fiber had broken at the microscopic level, which was quite an inconvenience to run. It was a case of real bad luck as I hadn't had any problems with these muscles since many months. Or maybe not, maybe I was looking for trouble. To my surprise up to kilometer 9 I was running at a pace of 5 min/km which was quite an improvement with respect to my usual 5:30 min/km when training. In the heat of the moment I guess I just couldn't help running this fast (for me). The fact is that everything was going entirely smoothly up until the injury when each stride became a little agony. At some point I even contemplated quitting but in the end I stubbornly kept on running. Although the last 8 kilometers of the race were quite a nightmare the joy derived from the experience was absolutely worth it. Indeed, I can't wait to repeat it again next year.