Fit To Ride
Awareness of the outside world. Premier Charity Cerebral Palsy Education Centre.
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Virtual Melbourne Marathon
Official – December 5-13, 2020
My Date – Thursday, December 10, 2020
Bib Number – 2729
Location – unnamed corporate park, Inverness, AL
Time – 49:20 officially, 1 hour 7:23 minutes actually
Results, Overall – 280 out of 377 official, 350 calculated with actual time
Results, Gender – 173 official, 225 actual
Results, Gender/Age – 29 official, 49 actual
Trackers – race app, Map My Walk
Why Melbourne?
Because I am a digital tourist in Australia right now. [Biking Virtually, Great Ocean Road]
And because I went a wee bit overboard with horse show ribbon replacements medals this year. This will be my last bling walk of the year. Had fun. Plan to do only a handful next year. We’ll see how well I predict the future. [Will Walk For Bling]
Why A Second One?
Yesterday was supposed to be my virtual walk for this. I remembered the official app when I was half way through. I figured I’d go out again the next day to see what the official app had to offer. Why not? What else I got to do? [5K to Nowhere]
The app gave km announcements in Australian and a few signposts along the way. “The Tan was originally constructed in the early 1900’s as a tanbark horse-riding track.” Only Melbourne: Tan Track.
As with Peachtree the trade-off didn’t seem worth the hassle and eventual failure of creating one’s own app. BTW, I did not redo Peachtree because a) I had already used their app, 2) it was 10k rather than 5k, and, most importantly, 3 or c) it was the weekend. [Strolling By The Lake]
Virtual races existed in the before times. I signed up for Virtual Gaelic Gallop in January. “For our runners that can’t make it to Kentucky there is a virtual 5K option, too!” BreyerFest Blog: The Gaelic Gallop!. Little did we know that ‘runners that can’t make it to Kentucky’ would be everybody. Virtual-everything got a huge boost with the pandemic. It will be interesting to see how virtual races evolve over time.
Why Here?
I’m running out of new parks, at least of new parks/walking tracks that I am willing to drive to. The nearest one I have not done was more hiking in the woods than I cared for at the moment. After 5k the day before, I wanted a flat, paved route that I could motor around.
Why So Fast?
Another failure for a race-specific app. Google Earth says the lake sidewalk is just under a kilometer. Five times around should have been 4 1/2km, not 5. My official pace was 9:52 minutes per kilometer. I was making good time, but not that good. Nor was I taking shortcuts across the lake as the GPS image shows. I was in sight of a cell tower the entire time so it doesn’t have the same excuse of dense foliage that I did for the Peachtree walk.
Oh well, go out. Got fresh air. Saw the sun. I finished the extra distance while wandering around taking photos, hence the massive drop in pace.
Time would probably have been between 50 and 55 minutes, or 10 to 11 mpk. I marched along. Didn’t stop for either photos or notes, The only time I paused was to pick up a stray fishing line. I remember seeing signs about this at Joe Tucker. Helena teen improves Joe Tucker park for Eagle Scout Project, by Staff Reports, September 2020. [Lake Reflections, Joe Tucker Park]
Stay safe. Stay sane.
Katherine Walcott
Virtual Brush Box 
👍
🙂