It falls upon me finally to wrap up the Spring Speed Challenge - and I am delighted to see that it has become known as the SSC on here and Strava, I believe I have Mr Tbae to thank for that! xxx
Once again, the majority of runners chose 5 km as their distance, but it was nice to see more of the shorter distances this time, with a 1-miler, a few 1Ks, and even a 200 metre entry! And it was wonderful to have the lovely Langley-Loper tackling a 10K with style once again 😊😊😊
As ever, I have simply plotted the data in terms of s/km increase or decrease per week. I have omitted any non-running weeks and included lines between the data points, for ease of viewing. This time I changed the x-axis to show "Runs" rather than "Weeks" to account for people who may not have started in the first week of the Challenge. But it's essentially the same thing 😊
We had some troubles and triumphs this time, some runners didn't quite make it, but I hope you'll be back for another try! Others peaked earlier in the Challenge, then faded a little - but I hope you guys all could see how much you were able to achieve in that moment and celebrate it!!!
We also, once again, had some pretty stunning and consistent work! Although of course we can't compare these results competitively - the distances and conditions are far too different. But here are my highlights:
💥 Honourable mentions!
★ Maddee_6333 I love the way you have surprised yourself! Well done!!!
★ Tbae you suffered a horrid disappointment and rose above it!!!
★ pianoteacher you worked really hard and seemed to gain an awful lot of insight!!!
💥 Superstars!
★ C3PO "I haven't seen times like that in a long time" - amazing work!!!
★ Oldfloss - just wow!!! And I wish you a speedy recovery xxx
★ Katnap it's always great to see a new face, and a new distance - and goodness me did you push yourself?!!! Awesome!!!!
BUT OF COURSE a massive well-done to everybody, and many thanks to SkiMonday for your helpful rain strategy: "get wet" 😄 Solid performance there btw, and you too, MadDave !
Hope to see you all back in August for a Summer Speed Challenge! We can recycle the nickname 😊😊😊
And I'll leave you with this interesting motivational quote that Floss found:
"Whatever distance you believe you can run, is the exact distance you will end up running"
Happy running!
Sqkr & roseabi xx
Written by
roseabi
Ultramarathon
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Well done to Katnap, Floss and C3PO.Of course everyone and Marie did work her socks off.Look out next time if pianoteacher is around, we will certainly get a run for our money.
Cannot believe how much I have learned from SSC and everyone on here and the magic forum.
It’s a myth that you cannot increase your pace with age.I am sure Floss will forgive me, but she has dispelled that one.I am determined to follow her there.
Thank you so much Abi, hope the field increases even more next time.I loved your inclusion of shorter distances this time.Just gives another option to allow participation if you are returning into your training for example.
As you can see I dropped out at week 4 - pressure of work etc prevented me from getting out and then for week 5 I was in the Lake District so very different terrain 😬
I’ll be back in the summer and hope to complete the challenge this time.
Those 10ks were a killer but this challenge made me go out every Monday whatever the weather. Then week 5 the club ran the route backwards which totally floored me. Oh well, 4/5 ain't bad.
Next time I think I will pick a shorter Strava segment, although a short distance does make it difficult to achieve big improvements.
Thanks for organising and for everyone valiantly taking part.
I remember when I went along to my second-ever parkrun, feeling confident that I knew the route this time, and they were running it the other way round - I was devastated!! 😂
Thanks for the honourable mention and for organising this Abi.
Although I didn't see any improvement on my first attempt I did learn an awful lot from giving it a go - mainly to
1. Stop obsessively looking at pace during a run - just run!!
2. Run fast but not so fast you fear you might empty the contents of your stomach over the pavement 😂
3. Don't create arbitrary time goals. I desperately wanted to go under 10 mins on each attempt but actually infantry are only required to run sub 10:15 at Selection (faster in basic training dependant on role) and I managed this three times during the challenge (including the sub 10 first attempt) as a 43 year old woman who's only been running for a year. I'm pretty proud of that 😁
Excellent work speedsters! Bit sad I couldn't take part this time, I do love a speed challenge 😔 but you all did a cracking job so I can live the triumph through you 😁
Thanks roseabi. I've been leading a real world C25K group and we're now in Week 5. I find my recovery time is longer after speed work but using the early C25K intervals helped as a useful and easy warm up.
Looking forward to improving my 1k distance for the next challenge!
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