Did that thing where I automatically looked at my wrist to check my watch.
I don't really know what I was checking for.
No, now I'm not too sure. Now I feel like I'm going too slow. Ah, no idea!
I've only got about half a kilometre left but I'm really tired. Ah, come on!
It's just not my day, is it? Not my day.
Hi there. My name's Melanie.
Melanie got in touch with The Running Channel to set a challenge for the
Running Channel team in the next episode of our Challenge Accepted series.
And I challenge The Running Channel to a 'Guess Your Running Time' challenge.
Anna, Andy, Kate, and our All Stars challenger, Katie brown,
AKA Paces and Porridge, will be taking on this challenge.
Katie is an avid runner with impressive race times and everything from a 16
minute 51 second 5k to three hours,
11 minutes and 23 seconds for the marathon.
But how will she fare at Challenge Accepted?
The rules of this challenge are as follows: each Running Channel presenter
and all-star competitor Katie brown must cover a distance of five kilometres.
You must predict your final 5k time before you set off. The winner is the
person who runs the time closest to their prediction.
You're not allowed to use any tracking technology for this challenge.
Now we want The Running Channel viewers to set the next task in our Challenge
Accepted series, so make sure you leave your suggestions in the comments.
So on the one hand,
I love this challenge because there's no requirement for me to go all out,
which there usually is. So actually I could go pretty steady if I wanted to.
But on the other hand, in my professional career,
I prided myself on my ability to judge my pace.
That was the key to running well,
that's also the first thing that deserted me as soon as I stopped running
competitively. So I'm really nervous about that.
I just don't think I'm going to be very good at this.
What's going to be tough is actually just getting that time. Um,
because quite often I say that I'm going to aim between, uh,
maybe like 18 to 18 and a half minutes, but, um,
I think that's going to be too big a boundary to win this competition.
So I'm gonna have to really think about how I'm feeling today. Um,
and what I think I can manage. So thinking about my tactics for this run,
I have just logged on to my Garmin Connect to look at some of the
previous runs that I've been doing. Because I'm coming back from injury,
a lot of them are 30 minutes easy,
and I know that I've been covering 5k in 30 minutes on those easy runs.
So rather than going for like a PB,
I'm just going to stick with what I know. I obviously
don't want to get injured again either.
So this is part of my training for Berlin marathon. Yeah.
The predicting of the time it's going to be quite tricky.
First tactic was to head somewhere flat.
So that's where I am now. Gonna get out of the car, see how I feel,
and then make my prediction.
I'm going to try something different.
I'm going to try starting easy and getting a bit quicker at the end. I mean,
a big problem is pacing.
I'm not sure how confident I am in my pacing abilities.
I sometimes do get a little bit carried away.
And then we also all do know that, that all too common feeling
of that last half a kilometre where we're just so tired
and we do slow down.
Okay. Auto lock is off on my watch.
I've set an alert for 5k so that I know that it'll buzz in my pocket
when it's finished. So let's take it off my wrist, get outside,
get my GPS, and get a wriggle on.
I'm going to go for 21 minutes on the nose. 4 minutes 12 per kilometre,
just outside 6:30 miling I think. That's my target time.
Hopefully not too fast, but also not too easy.
I might get carried away with the adrenaline. So, I reckon,
my prediction today
is going to be 18:42.
So I'm going to go for as close as possible to an absolute
dead on 25 minutes.
So I'm going to predict my 5K time as 29
minutes and 42 seconds.
Let's see how we go. Quick, before they start this challenge,
pause the video right now and comment who you think is going to win,
but no cheating and no peeking.
We're off. The tan mark proves there's no watch.
I'm not wearing it on the other rest either just in case Anna accuses me of
cheating, which she regularly does. Feels strange, not having a watch on,
even though I don't actually look at mine that much when I'm running,
I tend to look at the times afterwards, which either bodes well or not
well at all.
I've just remembered there's a road crossing ahead.
I really hope the traffic lights are on my side. Bad planning.
Come on. It's the hill next and I am not sprinting up that. Go go go!
Just running in the rain, what a wonderful feeling, I'm-
Another tactic I did, so I don't know if this is cheating,
but I'm using music as a bit of an indicator as what
kilometre I might be on.
So I've listened to one song, usually about four minutes, ish.
So I reckon I'm over 1 K. Feel alright,
I reckon I might have started off a bit too quick though.
Unfortunately,
my headphones have just stopped working, ran out of charge.
Three songs in, got a bit of Pendulum, Rage Against the Machine, and a
bit of Biffy Clyro, that's it.
I started off and thought, "Ah, you're going too fast, you're going too fast."
Getting too excited. Though now I'm not too sure, now I feel like I'm going too slow.
Ah, no idea!
So, two and a half laps in, that was one kilometer. I have a feeling I've
started a bit faster than my plan.
It feels kind of like 8 minute mile pace. Um,
so I might, I don't know, slow down a bit or
adjust the faster bit,
do it in the middle of something and then slow down. Bottom of the hill update,
not doing one on the way up.
This hill goes on... And, um,
I forgot I was gonna be talking to camera so should have knocked a few seconds
off. Um,
but I think this is about one mile on my route.
It's quite telling actually how used I seem to have got to the kind of the
regular beeping of my watch to give me my auto laps.
That's a mile done. Uh, definitely think that was quicker than 9 minutes.
Uh, probably about 8, I think. So I'll just slow down a little bit.
Have a little bit of a jog.
That didn't feel as bad as it has done in the last three weeks because my
training is working.
No better feeling than conquering a hill
that felt really hard two weeks ago and seeing the progress.
We've got an All Star cast member this time for this Challenge Accepted,
which is Katie, a complete unknown to me really.
So she could swoop in and take the win. And I would be none the wiser.
I wonder how she's getting on?
Okay. I reckon I'm halfway now. I'm starting to struggle a little bit.
I'm pretty sure this is roughly the two mile mark.
Um, sorry to whoever's editing this.
You're gonna have to put the conversions up on screen because my brain is firmly
in miles today. Sometimes I do miles. Sometimes I do kilometres.
What do you do? Leave a comment. Let's get the debate going. Again.
No idea.
If I know Anna - and I do -
she will undoubtedly have been distracted by dog and stopped to talk to it or pet it.
That could be my chance to leap frog her in the standings.
Don't stop for dogs, Anna. Oh, look at him. He's so fluffy.
Took everything in my willpower,
not to pet that dog then.
I do feel quite tired, I think I have gone a bit too quick
to the time that I predicted.
So I'm over halfway now and I'm pretty sure that I'm running at
like a very even 8 minute mile pace.
So I might have to do a mid- run change of strategy, um,
and just run the whole thing at this pace.
Kate is the dark horse here. I really think Kate, she
runs so often, she loves the technology, She runs on a track a lot as well,
which I've always found really helps with my pace judgement,
so my money's on Kate. I should back myself, I suppose,
but my money's still on Kate.
So coming up to my finish line,I have not put the finish.
That'd be a mile to go. This will be 8 and a half laps
done, four to go.
So I reckon I'm really near the end now. 'cuz I've wanted to look at my watch,
which suggests to me that
I want to be finished in that I'm tired.
Did that thing where automatically looked at my wrist to check my watch.
I don't really know what I was checking for.
Do we get any points for guessing each other's times? Hmmm.
Anna, I'm going to go with 28 minutes.
Kate,
I'm going to go with 22 and a half minutes. Then Katie I'm going to take a
stab in the dark and go for 25 minutes.
I reckon I've only got about half a kilometre left but I'm really tired.
Oh come on, keep going. One more crossing that I forgot about.
Runner, up ahead. Well hopefully,
he presses the button and I can catch up, and it doesn't change back.
He could really help me out here. Into the last 300 metres
now. I have a feeling I might have sped up fractionally.
Cause you, uh, I guess you just often do at the end of a run,
but even otherwise I think, so we'll see.
This is the bit where I'd absolutely bomb it down.
This is a nice gentle downhill and I've got another bit of a drag coming up,
but not knowing what pace I'm running at-
I think I'm about on point. Feels it.
Ooh. Bit of vibration. I think that's it. I think we're done.
I'm going to keep running just in case it wasn't, stop in a minute and check.
Okay. Here's the finish line. Aah, where's my watch? Ah.
Oh God, I'm not very good at pacing. That was, yeah, much faster than planned.
So I don't want to reveal anything other than this smug face.
I'm really pleased with this, really pleased and in fairness,
hats off to anyone who's done better because I backed myself here and I've done a
lot better than I thought I would do. So fingers crossed it's enough.
Let's see how the others gone. Oh dear.
I did it in 20 minutes and 56.7 seconds.
24:50 - 10 Seconds too fast. Uh, yeah,
I should have just done that to start with.
Just decided to run the same pace. I'm much better at that.
Big lesson learned - I'm terrible at pacing. Um,
and I was very far off my prediction. Um,
45 seconds off to be precise.
The actual results are in. 5K - 29:05.
I definitely think that it could be a valuable part of training just to practice
that actually I've set a pace to do this, sticking to it and
actually trying to just 'run to feel' a bit more often. So yeah,
definitely some learnings, even though I probably did come last.
I loved every second of that.
It was something different to think about while I was running.
But more importantly, I wasn't looking at anything.
I was able to actually take in my surroundings,
see things I probably hadn't even noticed on runs before,
because I was so focused on my pace and the stats and so on.
I love my watch and I love looking at analytics and finding out if I'm
progressing and, and looking at things like that. But every now and again, this,
this is what running's all about. Reminding yourself, being back with nature.
So give it a go: set yourself a target over 5K or 10K,
then go out and try and run it with no technology.
Let us know how you get on in the comments
or get in touch with us on social media - you guys are
the beating hearts of The Running Channel.
And if you haven't already please do subscribe, watch some more of our videos
now, check them out, let us know what you think, and we'll see you next time.