The route is a double loop down the rolling, wide streets of the famous San Vicente Blvd. I parked a few blocks away about 15 minutes before the gun, so I used that time to warm up on my shuffle to the start. After saying hello to a couple of people, I positioned myself in the crowd probably about 15-20 yards from the start and right around 7:30am, we were off!
After the usual dodging and weaving near the start, I finally broke free from the main herd and focused on running an even-paced 1st 5K and attempt to pick it up and negative split the 2nd half. I seriously don't know how to run these things and figured that was a good a plan as any. That was the plan anyway.
Mile 1 - 7:05
Mile 2 - 7:09
Mile 3 - 7:08
After making the turn to go out for the 2nd 5K loop, I was started to fatigue. My breathing, which was fairly easy for the initial 5K was now more rapid and shallow. My effort definitely dropped here and while I never focused on pace, I knew intuitively it had slowed some. A whole barrage of 'fight words' crossed my head but nothing really seemed to work. So instead, I just kept focus on form and breathing. I did some picking off and was never really passed myself until around the last .2 miles. When I saw the 5 mile mark, I picked up the intensity with the needle already red-lined.
Mile 4 - 7:22
Mile 5 - 7:21
Mile 6 - 7:08
Thankfully and mercifully, the race came to an end and when I stopped my Garmin, I was pleasantly surprised at my time of 44:50 knowing my PR was somewhere in the 44:XX (looked it up later and saw that it was 44:42 - 8 seconds! Rats!).
Giving my little medal a kiss post-race.
These races will never be my thing as I was never blessed with speed, but the mental fortitude that comes from being able to push yourself when every part of your body is screaming to stop is something I can look back and reflect positively on. In other words, I left it all out there.
I'm sure if I actually bothered to do speed work in my workouts, I'd net better results. But right now, I enjoy running for the sake of running and these races are always a good excuse to meet up with friends and do some hard breathing for as long as you're out there.
11 comments:
Nice performance! It's good to vary it up to keep running interesting and challenging.
Great job! You know that those shorter races don't have that much importance when you have to look up your PR. It sounds like one of your best, though, if you were right on the money.
Good luck next weekend! San Diego should be fun.
Great job and to drop a sub 45 out of the gate shows that there's some horsepower under the hood!
You threw out some great min/miles. Awesome!
That sounds pretty speedy to me, especially those first three miles. Racing is of course great 'speed work' so keep it up!
I love how you can be so spontaneous. ::smiles::
Congratulations on a great race even if you missed a PR by 8 seconds.
Good luck next weekend!
pretty rock solid. eh a few seconds off your PR...no worries about that! This is a great tune up before SD anyways. Nice split on mile 6 btw
nice job!
Glad you had fun even though you missed your pr :) I'm glad you're back out there and racing again! Look at you, where are your vibrams though? oh wait you don't wear them because they are stupid! ha ha ha
Nice work Billy! I hate 10ks, which is why I've only done one...they hurt!
hi Billy, i was the DJ for the event and it was a beautiful if not hot sunday morning! hope you enjoyed the music! good job on running!
I will be at the LA Cancer Challenge too in Oct which is almost at the same place but on the VA grounds and is one of the best runs I do every year! 5k and 10k so you might check it out.
DJ phillip kim
626-407-4949
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