One of my big goals for 2012 was to manage some training every week, no matter what else was going on. To that end, a parkrun with my brother-in-law and a mate, ticks the box on the final Saturday of the year.

Result: 18:45 (21st/286 overall)
Date: Saturday 29 December 2012
Format: 5km run (3 laps of tarmac paths, right-angle turns and puddles)
Event website: http://www.parkrun.org.uk/norwich/home
Full results: http://www.parkrun.org.uk/norwich/results/weeklyresults/?runSeqNumber=123

I’ve been feeling really grotty in the build up to Christmas with a couple of the cold viruses that have been doing the rounds. What with travelling around with family for Christmas too, December is going to have been the lightest month of training this year, but never mind. If I can get healthy to start 2013 that’ll be enough. Chris, and another mate of his, and I, talked each other into parkrun to close out the year. I woke feeling my lungs weren’t quite as tight, pulled on my new Orca Killa Kompression tights and we drove over to Eaton Park. It was as friendly and well organised as the Basingstoke parkrun, with almost 300 runners in attendance, including a great number from City of Norwich AC and other local clubs.

At the beginning of this year, I hadn’t run a sub-20 minute 5k for many years as far as I know, and I’ve now run sub-19 minutes several times. I feel like I’ve got a sub-18 in me, but it didn’t happen here. I set off with the speedsters at the front, and ran the first lap of 3 at 3:28 /km. (There weren’t kilometre markers, so I timed the laps instead.) However, Christmas eating and drinking and the crackly lungs caught up with me and the second and third laps were 3:51 /km and 3:54 /km respectively. 18:45 is a parkrun PB, but only good enough for 21st here. The fastest man ran 15:20 and set a new course record. That’s seriously quick!!

The sub-18 will have to go in as one of goals for the first half of 2013, when I write up my new year’s targets shortly!