The plan was to run the first 5k at a 8:00 pace and then do what I could to negative split.

The horn went off and I slowly worked my way though the runners. About 2 minutes in, there was a scrawny high school kid weaving in and out cursing at all of the "slow 10k'ers". It was kind of amusing watching him run the obstacle course through the crowd. Maybe they should have let the 5k'ers go first.

I settled into a nice, fairly moderate pace. I was a bit shocked to see the 7:4x & 7:3x times for the first two miles, but they did have a few slight downhill sections. Much of the 3'rd mile was making up for the downhill segments. Nothing really to call a hill, but I think most of the 3'rd mile was an incline of sorts.

As I hit the 5k starting point at about 24:00, I saw dodgersmom and gave her a quick wave. I was feeling good and thought I'd be able to hold that pace for one more lap, but I didn't think I'd negative split. At this point, I still didn't drink any fluids.

I took some water at the first aid station on the second loop, probably about 1/2 mile in. For the first time in my life, I drank the water while maintaining pace.

At the end of the 4'th and beginning of 5'th mile, I began to hurt a bit for the first time. I knew I'd not negative split, but I pushed on as hard as I could and it got a little better after a half mile or so.

With about 1/2 mile to go, I picked up the pace slightly back into the 7:xx range and held it for a while. Then, the stitch came on which slowed me down. I felt like walking to get it to go away, but I resisted and slowed the pace to the point where the stitch was tolerable. For some reason, it went away just as I was coming around the last corner and I was able to finish at a strong pace.

Perhaps I could have taken in more water, but for a 51 minute run I'm not sure I really needed it.

This is the first race where looking back at it I cannot say "I could have gone a little".

Grabbed a bottle of water and hung out with Marcy and watched John & Steve come in strong.


More consistent and more run training. But honestly, I'm completely excited about my performance.


Nice race, but really, I don't have much to compare it to.