Mark's Blog

The fastest 5K I ever ran was on the track at the High School in September after you graduated. I was just past 40 years old and you may remember we both lost a lot of weight that summer. I was probably weighing in the mid to upper 170's (80 - 81 kilos.) I was shooting to beat 21:30 as Matt had said the track coach told them they had to run faster than 21:30 to be on the team. I ran 21:22 so I quess I could have made the cross country team though perhaps as the slowest guy on the team.

I didn't run a measured 10K before 1997. That year, on the high school track, I ran 48:48 (approx. 7:52 per mile.) The last time I averaged under 8-minute miles for a 10K on the track was 1999, 49:32, at age 51. Like we've mentioned before, that is incredibly fast compared to people in my age group who do not exercise; quite fast compare to half-hearted, weekend exercisers; appropriately fast for a fitness runner who trains regularly and is not injured; too slow to win even the smallest local race if there are more than three people entered in that age group; and bears not the slighest resemblance to world record pace for 50 -55 year-old runners (around 30 -31 minutes in that age group?)

21:22 may not break any world records, but it must be better than 2 deviations above the mean.

I may not be running exactly 5 km. I'm not running on the track, but instead along a route Stuart's measured next to the river. Maybe I should go over to the track in Pontcharra to see if it's open to the public.

If Stuart has correctly measured the route I used to run regularly, a route now blocked off as they rework the banks of the Isere river to avoid flooding, then in the past I've run 5 km in less than 20 minutes before. To run it that fast, I have to push myself for the entire distance. We both have a long way to go if we want to win any races.