So I went to the track this afternoon, and found a few people from the local running community over there: they held a (very) small track race series for fun. This was a little bothersome, because they occupied the inner four lanes of the track. They had the 400 meters dash in like 10 minutes when I arrived, and they convinced me to participate - they let me in for free, because there were only 3 men in the race at that point. I thought maybe I could just use the opportunity to measure my 400 meters time. So without any preparation, at the end of a long workday, I ran a 400 meters race today. I guess I should go an and say...

2009 Summer Track Series

Presented by Strictly Running & The Columbia Running Club

400 meters Race Report

I was informed that the race starts in 7-8 minutes, so I had some time to warm up: I did 3 laps around the tracks (roughly 1270 meters, because I had to do 2 laps on the fifth lane, which is thirty-some meters longer). Then, after just a few minutes of delay, we lined up (all 4 of us). I was put on lane 3. I guess the organizer wanted to guess the levels of the runners and order us accordingly: the guy was on lane 1, was quite fast, and I knew the guy on lane 2, who - I know - is pretty good at long distance. He would beat me on any distance over 5 miles. I got lane 3, and a rather slow guy got lane 4. Of course I knew none of these men except for the one who ran on lane 2.

For those, who never saw track running on TV: lane 1 starts behind the other lanes, and then each lane is little further ahead to balance out the different lengths of the lanes. So the guy on lane 1 has the best position, because he can see everyone else. Also, if he passed another runner, he is definitely ahead of him.

We started the race. There is not much tactics on 400 meters. You just run like crazy. After 100 meters, your oxygen starts to run out, after 200 meters you start to hurt, after 300 meters, you want to stop more than anything, you gasp for air, and you think you will die, and then you have to sprint 100 more meters hard.

After 100 meters, I saw I was approaching the guy in lane 4, and I passed him at 150. Which was a really bad sign for him - we only did one turn at that point. At 200 meters, the guy from lane 1 passed me. I tried to hang on, but he was much faster than I. So I just ran the third 100 fairly fast, but not in suicidal pace. I was able to accelerate for the forth 100, and I actually got a little closer to lane 1 guy. He won the race with 1:06, I got second with 1:08. The other two guys were far behind us. Lane 2 guy (I'm supposed to know his name, but I'm quite bad with names) seemed to take it quite easy, and run like in a long distance event. Lane 4 guy was just probably slow.

My time is quite pathetic compared to competitive 400 meters runners, but according to Runners World's VO2 Max calculator, it shows 59.2 ml/kg/min, which is pretty good. That would make me capable to run a Boston Marathon Qualifier, if there were no other bottlenecks. :)

End of race report

Well, my interval training was a bit gruelling after this race, and I didn't quite hit my times on the subsequent 431 meter sprints (in lane 5), but I wasn't very far off. Anyway, I have to make a note to myself to change the interval training for Thursday, because the track series will take place on the university track every Tuesday for some time now. And I like to run in lane 1, 400 meters.