As previously mentioned on here, Saturday will be my first race of the year. I’ll be running the St Patrick’s Day 10 km race. The race will be my first in a series of shorter races leading up to the Ottawa Marathon in May.

My goal in the marathon is to run a 3:10 which is my current Boston qualifying time. In order to assess whether that is attainable I will be aiming for a 1:30 half-marathon time in the Minto Run for Reach half-marathon next month. If I can’t hit 1:30 next month I’ll re-assess my goal and likely aim for a time around 3:15 in the Ottawa Marathon.

As a result, my goal for Saturday is to run my half-marathon pace. For a 10 km race that works out to a pace of 4:15/km for a time of 42:40. Saturday should prove to be a good test of whether I am ready to run a 1:30 half next month which will in turn will test whether I should aim for a 3:10 or 3:15 marathon in May.