Best ever 10K run

Since changing from listening to music to audio books my 5K times are much more consistent varying buy only a few seconds each run. However, this dry, cold but sunny weather seems to be suiting my running even more as my average time appears to be dropping.

On Sunday I was up early and out for a 10K run. I have a nice 5K run which starts and ends exactly 5 minutes walk from my house so decided on twice around that. After my unplanned 14K run last week I thought this would ensure I kept to my intended distance. Luckily, with the early start there was nobody about so got my warmup walk done without interruption.

I set my watch going and started my run and within a couple of strides heard the dreaded "Battery Low" warning from my headphones. A minute or so later and that was it, they were dead. I must have forgotten to switch on the power when I plugged them in.

So my 10K was just me and my thoughts with no audio distractions, that's a disaster in the making!! Half way around my first lap, just in front were a few other people jogging along the path just where it narrows. I decided to over take them while there was no oncoming traffic so picked up my pace a bit. Having passed them I got back onto the path and continued my run.

On reaching the finishing point, I ended the session on my watch but didn't take note of the time until I got home. I had completed the 10K in 01:04:10.

I do not always remember to start and stop the session manually usually relying on the watch detecting a run which seems to include my warm down walk in the session. The last time I accurately recorded my 10K was a month or so ago and I did that in about 1 hour 15 minutes. So this time was a lot quicker and only just over twice my current 5K times so I was quite pleased. I suspect that after overtaking the joggers I must have kept up a faster pace without realising it.

My plan is to do the same route next weekend and time that as well to make a comparison. I am hoping to have a similar time as in the past I have been very inconstant in my run times.

[nowster Graduate10]

64 minutes is a great time for 10km. My best so far is 67.5 minutes.

The best thing to do seems to be not to push for speed when you're doing a 10k or longer but to just let it flow naturally. Speed improvements will happen if you're consistently doing a mixture of run types.

[Hidden in reply to nowster]

I have always struggled to regulate my speed and my times for a given distance were always erratic. I had reached about 8.5K when I ran with a friend at her pace which I felt was a bit slower than my natural pace and easily completed 10K so knew I could do it. I tried various tips regarding slowing down but didn't get on with them so just ran at whatever speed I felt comfortable at on the day and eventually got to the 10K running on my own. Listening to audio books rather than music is now really helping with consistency.

I ran with some new neighbours of mine last week, again at a slower pace and we (unintentionally) completed 14K which is the furthest I have ever run.

I have been sticking to a 5K run each day and 10K once a week and have been doing that for a while. I think I should now start increasing the distance again but not sure whether to increase the daily 5K, the 10K or both.

[nowster Graduate10 in reply to Hidden]

Do you have any rest days in that mix?

[Hidden in reply to nowster]

Not planned but generally there is one day a week that prevents me from running so an enforced rest. :(During the C25K I ran Mon, Wed and Fri and had weekends off but after that I tended to be less ridged and after a while the rest days got fewer and fewer.

[nowster Graduate10 in reply to Hidden]

I'm down to three rest days and four run days per week at the moment. I did like the two weeks where I ran every day, but I'm currently increasing duration/distance towards Half Marathon and that's needing rest days to get over the muscle soreness from the longer run each weekend.

[Jools2020 Graduate10]

Wow, that’s a great time, well done 👏👏👏👍