After my last post in this series, I promised to myself that I was gonna free up some more time to write these posts more frequently. Partially because I do enjoy writing these posts and partially because I like having some sort of backlog of what I did and how I felt during this period. I constantly learn new things and gain more and more experience, which translates into more and better running for me and it’s just nice to be able to look back to my progression in the future 😄.
Over the coming summer and autumn months, I have planned some more races, starting with the Belgian 10K road racing championships (don’t worry, I’m not competing against the big shots here, I’m only running the same course together with a bunch of other people one hour before the championships). At the time of writing this post, the event is already over and as you’ll read below, it went really well 😊.
Before diving into a summary of the races that are on my calendar for the coming months, I would first like to tell you that I have found some kind of consistency in my running, which really helps me in getting better and to avoid more injuries. Since the start of summer, I’ve been able to steadily run between 40 and 50km’s each week. If I tried to do this amount of mileage before, there was always something that started to hurt in my body which eventually caused me to take a step back. Right now, it’s been 8 weeks now with a mileage of over 40km and things are going good! I’m eating more, I try to focus on getting in the right nutrients (I feel like the extra proteins that I started to eat are really helping me out here) and I’m better at planning in my training during the week (and taking enough rest as well).
Now, over the next few weeks, I have a few smaller goals and one major goal that I want to achieve. First of all, I plan to participate in two 10K events and I want to run at least one of those in less than 45 minutes. This is a major barrier that I’ve been wanting to break since last summer (and failed to do so) and the extra training and mileage that I did over the last few months should help me to really get there this time. Secondly, I want to participate in the Brussels Airport Half Marathon, which will be the second half marathon that I run. Both goals are ambitious, but, at the same time, I feel like they are in reach. I’m going to give it my best and hope that everything continues to go as planned (and I will adapt if it doesn’t 😁).
The autumn race plan
Lokeren 10K (August 5th, 2023)
Length (planned / actual): 10km / 10km (See activity on Strava)
Goal time / pace: 00:45:00 (4:30 min/km)
Actual time / pace: 00:42:47 (4:15 min/km)
Result: 83 / 278
It’s the first week of August and the small city of Lokeren is bustling with life because of the annual Lokerse Feesten (a 10-day city festival with top-of-the-bill artists from all over the world). During these 10 days, a lot of festivities and events are planned, of which the Belgian 10K Road Racing Championships is one of them. The official championships start at 16h and consist of a mix of professional, semi-professional and amateurs that want to compare themselves to each other. Everyone is allowed to register and participate, but I must admit that I wasn’t up to the challenge of running together with the Belgian top and just chugging along in the back.
Instead, I registered for the “10K street race”. This event starts one hour early to the real championships and consists of the same parcours, but this time aimed at regular runners. I wasn’t really planning on going all out in this race since I was still partially recovering from the Lokerse Feesten (the night before), but all other circumstances where actually ideal. It was relatively cool (15 degrees) and there was some light rain, which sounds awful but is actually really good at cooling you down during race events. I’ve always wanted to run a 10K in less than 45 minutes and after failing to do so at the “Ballonloop” in Sint-Niklaas last summer, I wanted to give it another go in Lokeren.
I started out at a pace of 4:30 min/km, but soon picked it up to 4:10 – 4:15 min/km and noticed that I was able to sustain this (to my own surprise). Around 6 kilometers, it was hard, but I was able to keep on going and managed to push all the way through until I reached kilometer 8 and started to smell the finish line. The last 400 meters consisted of a loop on the track. Some people started to catch up with me and there was this inner urge that pushed me even further to avoid being overtaken. I could see the timer in the distance counting up the seconds and getting closer and closer to 43 minutes and since I was (apparently) in very good shape today, I decided to stay under this mark and eventually finished in 42 minutes and 47 seconds, a big improvement over my previous 10K PB of 47 minutes 11 seconds.
After the race, I waited a bit to see the real championships starting off and I was able to catch a glimpse of the professionals running their best 10K. It’s astounding to see how a human is capable of doing a 3K loop in less than 10 minutes.
Ballonloop Sint-Niklaas 10K (September 3rd, 2023)
Another 10K, one month after my PB in Lokeren. This event is a yearly-recurring race in my hometown Sint-Niklaas as part of the “Vredefeesten” (peace festivities, celebrating the liberation of Sint-Niklaas at the end of World War II). During these peace festivities, hot-air balloons from all over the world depart from the central market square and light up the sky with a mix of beautiful bright colours.
I had actually planned to try and achieve my sub 45 minute PB during this race, but since I (unexpectedly) already broke the record during the previous 10K race in Lokeren, I’m currently not sure what I’m going to do here. Should I run and try to break my PB again (which is going to prove really difficult)? Or should I just consider this as a fun tempo run and look at it from a training perspective for the Brussels half marathon on October 1st? I’m currently writing this blog post on the morning before the event, and I’m actually still doubting what I should aim for. The weather is nice, although pretty humid and moderately warm (at least for Belgium), but still better than last year (24 degrees today, compared to 27 degrees last year). I have been able to rest sufficiently over the last few days, but I’m not sure if the positive effects that I might see from the extra rest can cancel out the negative effects that the temperature and humidity will have on me today. I guess there’s only one thing to do and that’s to wait, try and see how my body responds 😅.
Ghent 10 Miles (September 17th, 2023)
Two weeks later, I crank up the distance a little bit to 10 miles (or 16 kilometers) for the Ghent 10 Miles. Following the very popular Antwerp 10 Miles that takes place every year in April, the city of Ghent started to organise a similar event in September. The first edition took place last year, in 2022, and hosted 2600 people. This year, they’re aiming for even more participants and to increase the publicity of this event.
Since I’ve studied in Ghent and I’ve been working there since 2019, I decided to register for the event. It’s a good preparation and a first step in increasing mileage towards the half marathon that I plan to run on October, 1st. I might go all out in this 10 miles race one last time and will slowly begin the taper towards this half marathon after this race, just to make sure I’m in perfect shape when that starts.
In April, I ran the Antwerp 10 Miles in 01:12:53 and I think there’s potential to improve this time a tiny bit. I’m aiming 1 hour and 12 minutes or less, but we’ll have to see if that is too ambitious or not 😁. My B goal will be 1 hour 15 minutes, the C goal is 1 hour 20 minutes (but I should really be better than that).
Brussels Airport Half Marathon (October 1st, 2023)
Finally, the top event of the autumn will be the Brussels Airport Half Marathon. This will be my second half marathon (I did one around the same time last year) and I’m really looking forward to it. I will be giving it my absolute best and I want to run it in less than 1 hour and 38 minutes (my PB currently stands at 01:40:52), so let’s hope the conditions are optimal on this day. I expect the weather to be fine, it will probably not be too hot, since we’re already October at this point. It all depends on how well I was able to rest the week before the race and how much I’m able to train the weeks leading up to it.
After this half marathon, I’m going on holiday to the US for 3 weeks where I will still be running, albeit less intensive and I plan to start the build-up for the winter / spring season slowly once I get back. Spring season will probably consist of a collection of the usual suspects (National Park Run, Antwerp 10 Miles, etc.) as well as one very special event: the Berlin Half Marathon for which I’ve already registered. The Brussels Half Marathon will be the perfect testing ground and should allow me to finetune my training plan 😁.