running

[beige_alert]

The modern standard length for a marathon is 42.195km. The longest distance I've run is 10 km, and my best time is 57 minutes, for an average of 10.5 km/hr. If I could maintain that pace for 4.22 times as long, which I couldn't, that would be approximately a 4 hour marathon, which I gather is something of a marathon beginner's idea of a halfway decent time. Men's record times are around 2:05, for an average of just over 20 km/hr. Women's records are around 2:19-ish, a speed of a bit over 18 km/hr. So... What's that sort of pace like? Well, I can manage 20 km/hr. In a 100 meter sprint. Pretty darn amazing to think of someone running that pace for two hours.

Similarly, I see the Tour de France guys do fairly long time trials at an average speed that I can manage momentarily, but only if I'm going down a sufficiently steep hill.

There are amazing people out there.