I finally took on a full Deka.Fit. Ten stations plus 10x500 meter runs. I had a blast and this is an amazing race format for me. It breaks up the running, can be accomplished without much disruption to my typical training and sports and has an ideal time domain.
6:45 - wake-up
7:45 - head to venue
8:30 - arrive, park, get in
9:00 - checked in and chill for a while, get the lay of the land, visit merch and booths
9:30 - start warming up for my 10 AM start
10:10 - start the race
11:30 - finish race and take some pictures
12:30 - home and into recovery mode (Normatec and Electrolytes)
The race went great. I wore my Saucony Guide joggers, calf sleeves and knee sleeves. I did not need the knee sleeves as the lunges were padded.
The runs were fine. I forget how nice it is to run on a flat course.
Lunges - smooth and steady
Row - steady
Box step over - paced well, a couple of longer pauses
Med Ball sit-up - paced well, a couple of long pauses, was not comfortable hooking feet in
Ski Erg - good rest
Farmer's Carry - set weights down twice
Air Bike - slow recovery
Dead Ball - ball was larger in diameter than I trained with, but over obstacle was easier than over shoulder
Sled Push-Pull - easy, but my judge miscounted my reps and I did 125 meters. Not a big deal.
Ram Burpees - easier than I expected and moved well.
I grabbed water 3 times, roughly every 20 minutes. I ran the majority of the runs with walking into and out of the stations. I finished in 1:14:41 which was in the ball park I expected. I was guessing between 1:10 and 1:30 as I was unsure how my left Achilles would feel. It was fine. I was just not conditioned.
I would definitely do this or a variation again. Looking forward to seeing the pictures and race splits.
UPDATE: Pictures and splits were released:
The splits seem accurate to me. There is some time in transition that gets added to the station scores.
Overall the 44:57.1 run was disappointing, but fair. I was planning on a 12:30 pace, but did my fair share of walking. 12:30 would have been 3:45 splits. My actual 15:00 pace resulted in 4:30 splits. Relative to the race leader who finished the stations in 22 minutes, I lost a lot of time on the runs Actual:
- 3:38
- 4:07
- 4:15
- 4:36
- 4:27
- 4:32
- 4:44
- 4:52
- 4:55
- 4:38
The stations felt pretty good.
- Lunges - 2:28
- Row - 3:11
- Box Step Over - 2:14
- Med Ball - 2:32
- Ski Erg - 3:07
- Farmers - 1:41
- Air Bike - 3:12 +2:12***
- Dead Ball - 2:49
- Sled Push/Pull - 4:33 (extra length) +2:54***
- Burpees - 3:53 +2:05***
Relative to the race leader, I lost 14 minutes on the zones. That is a lot less room for improvement. Certainly treating the air bike as a rest cost me time. The extra length on the sled cost me 50 seconds, but still well above the race leader. I knew the burpees would be slow and will not be improving that 2 minutes by much.
In terms of pacing and effort, I definitely hit the breaks after the Farmer's Carry. That was my second water break and it was generous. I cruised on the air bike and then settled into a peak 150 beats per minute instead of the 190 beats per minute peak I hit in Run 3.
At the final tally, I was 18th/18 Men 55-59 years old and 294/311 Men Overall.
I really like the gap to first metric and want to ramp my run mileage up this summer.
Long Run Monday - 3-5 miles
Speed Thursday - Track (1-2 miles)
Tempo Saturday - 1.5 to 2 miles
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Total - 5.5 - 9 miles per week seems sustainable.
