January 22-23 : Back-to-Back Heat Training

Bataan Death March Ultramarathon  preparations   of the 83nean runners continue.  After the 50-km “test” run last January 14-15, we all know that we have to keep training if we are  to be successful with our BDM adventure.  No sweat, no treat.

Ghibz, Ernie, Rico, Butch, me, Ron, Fards and Ed braving the heat inside Camp Aguinaldo

Ruben “Fards” Fajardo , Ernie Badong and myself  did a training run inside Camp Aguinaldo under the heat of the sun from the early morning hours to noontime this Sunday (January 22).  We were accompanied in this  heat training run by fellow Ateneo de Naga HS Batch 1983 runners Ed Balcueva, Noel “Ghibz” Guevara, Rico Sabalvoro and Ron Hemady.  Another classmate, Butch Concon, though he did not run,  was on hand to keep us company.

After the training run, we had our lunch at the nearby Pan de Amerikana restaurant, where we were joined by Batch 83 classmate Art Puncia.  The main agendum of this lunch meeting was the support we would give our fellow 83nean, Bob Castilla, as he goes for his first 160-km Bataan Death March this coming weekend of January 28-29 from Mariveles, Bataan to Capas, Tarlac. An extraordinary adventure by an extraordinary person.  We would surely and gladly be on hand.  Bob has requested 4 Batch 83 runners (Ernie, Ed, Fards and me) to pace him from the Km 102 marker in San Fernando, Pampanga    to the Km 160 marker in Camp O’Donnell, Capas, Tarlac.  BDM runners are allowed   pacers (one at a time)   from Km 102 marker onwards. 

Lunch at Pan de Amerikana with Art

Given that Monday, January 23, was a non-working holiday to celebrate the Chinese New Year, I took advantage of the situation and scheduled another long run.  Question is where and what time?

The answer(s) presented itself when my son, Marcel, asked me to drive him to his classmate’s house in Capitol Hills Golf Subdivision, Quezon City (which is near the Loyola Heights campus of the Ateneo de Manila) for a group study from 10am to 3pm.    Perfect as this would allow me to do another  training run under the noontime sun.   

In the shadow of an Ateneo sports great

There is a 3-km route inside the Ateneo campus and I ran 8 times around this loop, for a total of 24 kms.  I clocked each loop and hereunder are the results:

                1^st loop                                  24 mins 5 seconds

                2^nd loop                                 23 mins 34 seconds

                3^rd loop                                 22 mins  5 seconds

                4^th loop                                 21 mins 4 seconds

                5^th loop                                 22 mins 25 seconds

                6^th loop                                 23 mins 53 seconds

                7^th loop                                 22 mins 47 seconds

                8^th loop                                 21 mins  35 seconds

              Average                                   22 mins 41 seconds
                                                         (almost 8 mins per km)

Would I be able to maintain an 8 mpk pace for the entire 102 kms.?  I will surely try but I guess the more realistic scenario is to add 2 more minutes per km (as Galloway would suggest), resulting in a pace of 10 mpk.  Running 10 mins per km for the whole 102 kms will give me a target finish time of 17 hours, one hour within the cutoff time of 18 hours. 

Sweet.  This inspires me to train even more.