First HK race. Met Roberto outside of MTR station, and he graciously gave me a ride to and from the race. The race was up a hill to a reservoir, but was mainly flat for the actual course. Update on weather: 83F, 82% humidity. They didn't start the race til 8:15, it would have been a bit better weather if it had been 6:15, but they are not early risers here. Because of weather, little warm up was needed and advised. Roberto introduced me to many runners, many of them expats. The guy runners were quite good, and I met several of the top runners. Plan was to start at 6:10 pace and see if I could hold it. 6:10 would give me the course record and some more shoe vouchers. there were a couple of thousand runners from looks of it, and the trail was fairly narrow (about the width of the provo river trail) so many guys started quickly. I didn't see any ladies around me, but the course had a 180 at 5k so I knew I'd be able to see the ladies at that time. Splits were 6:10, 6:11, 6:19, turn around, see #2 lady is maybe 20 seconds behind, So hot, and resigned to 6:20 pace, hoping to not crash and burn and embarrass myself. Rest of splits were 6:24 (trying to keep pace with a pack of men ahead of me), 6:13 (passed by 1 guy, pass three others), then 5:46 for .25. The course director is meticulous with his course measurement, so it was probably right on 10k. I just did some unideal swerving. My watch says 39:06, official time 39:04 (I stared at my watch for a bit before deciding to turn it off). They put out a tape for me and I broke it! my first tape break. I think the next woman was a couple of minutes behind me. They let you double dip for prizes, so I got $1500HKD in vouchers from a mizuno shop (enough for 2-3 pairs of shoes), another pair of mizuno shoes from the race, a polaris watch and a cool trophy. Everyone got tshirts. They had water along the race (3 times) but it wasn't enough for me, and they had water bottles at the finish, but no food, so note to self, bring your own after race replenishment! Good race though for only about $15 entry fee. I wish I could have gotten the course record, but I am happy I didn't unravel substantially and rallied a bit at the end. A good start. Here's a highly hyperbolized article about me--haven't had a news article written about me in a news paper since high school, so I guess I shouldn't complain they confused being an Olympic hopeful with being an OTQ hopeful :D From the South China Morning post, 8/15/2011 HK move casts doubt on Olympic dream | American Lowry has to rethink London 2012 qualifying strategy because of lack of marathons |
(has a picture of me, I will try to post a link on facebook) Olympic hopeful Michelle Lowry will have to rethink her plans of qualifying for next year's London Games after moving to Hong Kong 10 days ago.The American easily won the 11th annual Chung Hing Cup at Tsuen Wan yesterday but her immediate concern is finding suitable marathons in which to compete if she is to qualify for the Olympics. To make the US Olympic trials, Lowry must run a sub-two hour, 46 minute marathon before December, and choosing where to race is posing a question now that she is based in Hong Kong. "Obviously a US marathon would be good for me, but I'm also looking at the possibility of running one of the European marathons," said Lowry, 34, who loaded up her three children and set off for Hong Kong to join her husband, a professor of information systems at City University. Lowry has won nine distance races in the US in the past year alone, and yesterday got her first taste of Hong Kong road running in the Chung Hing Cup. "Obviously I'm not used to this type of heat and humidity, but I enjoyed the race nonetheless," said Lowry, who clocked 39 minutes and four seconds to win the 10-kilometre race by almost two minutes. "Actually it's fun to arrive in the summer when the conditions are probably at their most difficult," added Lowry, who led the race from start to finish. "My time of 39 minutes actually felt like 37 minutes today - it really was very hot and very humid." Lowry set her personal best marathon time of 2:47:08 in Connecticut at the end of last year, so has run pretty close to the qualifying time already. Training in Hong Kong will be challenging for the Utah native, and with three children (aged 11, 9 and 7) to look after she will be busy as she has no immediate plans to hire a domestic helper. Fellow American Colin Fishwick, also 34, staged a repeat performance of his win over the same course a month ago in the Chairman's Cup by taking the men's title over Ip Hoi-yeung in 34:11. Fishwick led a group of runners at the head of the 950-strong field, including Canadian Kirk Sabean, who finished third yesterday, and by the 5km turnaround point the race was between just him and Ip. The American then stepped on the gas at the 6km mark to open up a lead on Ip, who finished second in 34:57. Fishwick, who works at the American Consulate in Central, revealed that his Hong Kong posting would come to an end in April next year and that he would move to Rabat in Morocco for a two-year posting. "I plan to race as much and as hard as I can through the coming season and will probably sign off with the Hong Kong Marathon in February," said Fishwick, who was based on the mainland before moving to Hong Kong, and speaks fluent Putonghua. "I had no idea just how organised and competitive road running was when I arrived here and I will certainly miss it when I leave." Everyone is making a big deal about me not having a live in maid. They cost about $7,000 per year, and with tuition and travel expenses, not sure it's important enough to get one. It will take a couple of months to figure out exactly how much it really costs to live here.
| 
