Tuesday, October 16, 2007

Were Saturday's cross country times any good?

When running a race over a different surface (i.e. off-road), I sometimes find it quite difficult to work out whether my time was good or not. Take Saturday's cross country, for example. My official time was 15.37 for the 4k route. The fastest time of the day was Robert Russell of Central, who finished in 12.13, and Ali Hay of Central was next with 12.18. The other Strathearn guys ran 14.31 (Digby), 15.08 (Simon) and 14.18 (Colin).

As the course was a distance of 4k, is it reasonable to multiply these times by 2.5 to get a 10k equivalent road time? Looking at the evidence, I think it is. Robert's 'converted' 10k time works out at 30.32, and Ali's works out at 30.45. Robert recently won the Stirling 10k in a time of 30.47 - it's close enough to his time on Saturday to suggest my method works quite well.

That means my '10k equivalent' time on Saturday was 39.02 - probably about right given the way I ran, and the fact it was only 6 days after a marathon. On that basis I can conclude it was a reasonable performance: not fantastic, but ok. As for the other guys, Digby's time works out at a '10k equivalent' of 36.17, Simon's at 37.50, and Colin's at 35.45.

There is another cross country this Saturday, with the first East League meeting taking place at Broxburn. I ran there last year: I'm pleased to say it was a traditional cross country course with mud, steep hills, and a biting cold wind. It looks like there will be a good turnout from Strathearn Harriers. I'm looking forward to it already :)

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