This was my first running race since June, 2012 -- have been dealing with a nagging knee injury since July, 2012 and didn't really start running again until August, 2013. This race was about determining where my run fitness is (getting a new baseline) and not using what I'd been doing a year and a half ago as a basis. I've only been running for a few months (only been above 10mpw since October), so not yet at a volume that I'd like to be at, but I'm working my way there. Based on all of that, I was not going in expecting a PR of any sorts....I just wanted to see where my fitness was.

In the time that I haven't been running, I've been cycling a lot, and have done a number of 20 minute power tests. I've learned that if I go out too hard at the start, I'm going to die part-way through and not get a very good representation of my fitness. So lately I've been starting a little under my target power and building throughout the 20 minutes. I had a conversation with myself that I should follow that idea for this race -- don't go out and blast a 6:45 first mile only to limp it in at 9:30 at the end! So I started out easy, purely basing my pace on RPE (not looking at my pace at all). When I got to mile 1, I saw that I did it in 8:02, which is fast for me!

At this point, I took note of how I was feeling -- things felt pretty comfortable, I wasn't feeling any pain (joints, muscles, cardio-wise), so I started to push it a little more. I hit the turn-around and started to come up on a guy I used to swim with (Brice). I was starting to feel the burn at this point, but continued to push it. Brice realized it was me (I would have said "hi", but I didn't want to waste my precious breath!) and he settled in at my pace. It was nice to have someone suffer along with me. We hit mile 2 and my watch read 7:47 -- awesome, the additional effort did result in a faster pace! I wondered if I could make the third mile faster than that....I felt doubtful as I don't know that I've ever even run a 7:47 mile in my life! But I was going to try like hell.

Brice and I continued together and about half a mile out, he noted that we only had a few minutes to go. We picked it up again. Coming down the last block, there was no one in front of us except the photographer....I'm sure there are a bunch of pictures of the two of us coming in with me looking like I'm ready to die! My race pictures are all pretty terrible....this will certainly be no exception!

As we turned into the parking lot and could see the finish line, Brice said, "Let's go!" I kicked it up a little bit, but I really had paced this race very well and didn't have a lot left to give at the end....I told him to go and he crushed it! I cruised it in and saw the third mile split come in at 7:41....awesome!!! I literally could not have paced this race better, each mile slightly faster than the last. I'm very happy with how this went.

Oh, and my previous 5k PR was 25:32, so I pretty much crushed that....and I wasn't expecting to at all, so it was really nice to see that the "run lots, mostly easy" plan I'm following does work! And I'm really excited to see what I'll be able to do in the future when I'm up at a running volume that I'd like to be at....but I'll continue to build that cautiously and do everything I can to stay healthy.

Not a damn thing! I'm so happy with how I paced this -- the experience I've gained has shown me how to race smarter.

Obviously in the future, I'd like to have more run volume (and a slightly warmer day!), but for where I'm at right now, I think I raced this about as well as I could.

Grabbed a banana and a water and promptly consumed them (god, why am I always so hungry?!?!), did a little bit of stretching (probably not enough, but will foam roll later), changed into some dry clothes, and then BS'ed with Brice, his wife, Melanie, Jim, Robbie, and Cathy until awards.

Somehow managed to land on the podium, so I waited around for awards, then got in my car and cranked up the heat because it was cold!!


Not as much run volume as I'd like, near-freezing temperatures


This race isn't anything super special, but I'd definitely do it again. The fact that they had packet pickup the day before the race, but didn't hand out timing chips until the morning of the race was kind of weird to me -- wish we could have just picked up packets morning of instead. They also didn't post a course map or start time anywhere, which I thought was weird. But the race went off fine, so no big deal in the end.