Seven weeks ago I sprained my ankle. It was a pretty unfortunate moment that caught me by surprise, rendered me unable to walk for a few days, and took some patience to heal. But now, almost two months later, I’ve managed to smash through my previous PB, setting a new personal best time for my 5km run.
Typically, I run around my neighbourhood, which involves crossing roads, side-stepping people (which is why I sprained my ankle), and otherwise dealing with uneven terrain and an elevation shift of about 44 meters. But I do manage to get down to a local pack, which has an 8-lane track around the football field, where I can really let loose and focus on my pacing.
It was at this field I finally managed to break through the 24 minute barrier, which had eluded me for quite a while. Each run I go on I manage to easily hit a 25 minute 5km, with some seconds to spare. If I really push it, I can slip in under 25 minutes for a mid-range 24 minute. But now, I’ve finally secured something faster than 24 mins, if only just: 23 minutes and 49 seconds.
I feel pretty proud being able to crack that 24 minute mark. It meant having an average pace (min/km) of 4:44, with my fastest being 4:24 and my slowest 5:02. Being able to bring those number in a bit closer together would be great, as that’s about a 40 second disparity between the first and fourth kilometre.
As for what brought about this new PB, I’m not too sure. Maybe I was feeling more energized that day. Perhaps the air was a bit cleaner or my form a bit better. However, what definitely helped was that there was another bloke there who was absolutely blitzing it around the track. I asked him later on what pace he was hitting, and it turns out it was about 4:10 – which is rather impressive. The reason I think he helped was that I attempted to not lose too much distance on him. I stuck to the inside track and him the outside. While I stopped at the 5km mark to record my time (before going for another 3km), he went on to hit 13km.
I guess it really does help to have a running partner – even if it is just me trying to keep up with a stranger. It’s so easy to let myself off the hook and slow down, when I probably don’t need to. Having someone to keep pace with means I need to actually push myself, to hit a pace I can definitely hit but otherwise don’t want to when I’m in the moment.
But here I am, with a new PB and a new goal: to hit that sub-24 minute mark again. It’ll probably only happen at the track, as there’s little interference there, but at least my runs around the neighbourhood ought to be quicker now. Unless of course I go for a run after leg day.
