Greetings from Lagos

I didn't have much time to reflect after the race on Sunday - but here are some thoughts.

Just before the race, we were chatting with Joe and we agreed that any time between 2:10 and 2:15 would be good.

I remember thinking: "maybe I can run a sub2 once. Not for this race, with all those hills, but maybe next season. Would be cool."

But hey, from the beginning the legs were fast, and I reckoned rather see how far it takes me then slow down now and never know.

Legs stayed strong all the way, and I even started overtaking buses. Made sure not to check the time on their flags - just not to mess up my mind.

The last 5kms Nobert from MCCRR came to "fetch" me and paced me nicely all the way to the last stretch - that really helped.

Funny how I was hoping to run a 21 at 5:40 maybe one day, and now I ran it 5:20 just like that. Go figure.

Sure, you never know how your race is going to be until race day, and hey I've been feeling pretty strong lately.

I guess my main takeaways are:

•⁠ ⁠It has taken me 4 years to get back to a certain level of fitness. I hadn't expected it to take that long.

•⁠ ⁠Consistent training helps of course

•⁠ ⁠An intelligent training method and program makes all the difference

•⁠ ⁠And most of all @⁨Oliver Ruhl⁩ with all your personal concerns, to know when to push a bit harder and when to give support. I don't see AI figuring that out anytime soon - so we're stuck with you for now.

What also gets me is that most of you can run a 5:20 on one shoe, and you still are genuinely excited about me breaking my PB. That's what I like about running - that we're competing primarily with ourselves.

So yah, lekker and thanks for the support - see you on the next one!

- Camilo