Today saw me tackle my third Bridge to Brisbane, and as seems to be tradition, I went in feeling a little underprepared.
An ankle sprain from the Kokoda Challenge last month had regressed (because I ran on it one day whn I knew better) and I'd ended up spending the last three weeks icing, compressing and resting the ankle. Or the lower leg. Or whatever muscle group has actually been the problem. In any case, I've not been running and that was never going to be ideal preparation even if it is only a 10km race.
Good thing, then, that I had a decent level of base fitness to leech off of.
I know from experience to leave early because of the number of people trying to access the start line, and with the 10km start time shifting from 7am to 6.25am, this meant I was up around 4am and left home around 5am. This worked well for me because I seemed to be ahead of most of the traffic that bottlenecks around Wynnum Rd.
After a few scatter-brain issues like dropping things in the dark and leaving things in the car, I walked my way towards the start line. The walking and green (sub 60 min) running groups already had a large collection of people gathering even around 5.45, and it feels ridiculously selective when officials wave you through to the red and blue starting zones. Sure, I run fast enough to fit there, but it's probably the first time I've been in a "seeded" section in a long time and it was a little different. Definitely less crowded.
The gun went off on time at 6.25 from what I could tell, and from the front sections there was a lot less congestion getting to the start line. I'm not sure how long it took, but the mass of people were jogging not long after the gun so I imagine it was only maybe 20-30 seconds.
The other noticeable differences for me today were that there was a lot less people-density starting ahead of the generic start zones, and the crazy heat. Normally it's still cool enough before the race starts that you have to move or stretch to keep warm. Today it was warm enough that I hadn't even contemplated bringing anything with sleeves.
In fact, while my ankle held up really well despite my expectations that it would blow out at some point, it was my lack of recent training and the heat that became my biggest issue of the day. I felt reasonably drained by the 6km mark despite sitting on roughly 5min/km pace and while I figure some of that was lack of training the heat wasn't helping. It was not long after this point that I saw the 45 min pace running sprint past (obviously being behind me wasn't going to help pace anyone to the line in 45 mins), but a kilometre or so later on the ICB ramp he was helping carry a very wobbly looking guy up the road. Presumably none of that was how he expected his morning to turn out.
By the time I hit the 9km mark I was feeling a tad nauseus and was simply repeating the "just 5 more minutes" mantra. In fact, there's a nice little downhill leading into the showgrounds and I still didn't try and run any faster.
When I looked at the clock after crossing the line it said 50:32 which is pretty respectable, particularly given that I didn't feel all that great running it. Guess I'll find out later in the week if that translates to a sub-50 nett time and whether I get to keep the red number for next year.
