My work filter won’t let me see the page. I’ll check it out tonight.
Guess I shouldn’t have put so much porn on it.
Now that I’ve got a little lull in my day’s activities, I’ll pass on my actual 5K PR of 19:13, which I set on March 14th on the exact same course that I ran solo on Saturday. Funny that I was slower by eleven seconds on my second attempt, when I thought that I could pace myself better with practice. I actually biked the course a couple of times (easy for me to do, because it goes right past my house) and memorized landmarks representing every quarter mile. Plan was to even-split or slightly negative split, setting a pace slightly higher than my average for the race. I was keeping on pace nearly exactly for the first mile and a half, but started falling off a little after that. Even tried to pick it up a little over the last few hundred yards, but failed to make up for lost time.
Apart from the lack of “race day magic,” the only possible culprit I can think of was the wind - very slightly stronger on my second attempt, and slightly different direction. Also, in the actual race I went out harder in the first mile in order to stay in the draft of some of the leaders, running upwind. Recorded a 5:50 split for the first mile, which represents a pretty dramatic positive split - overall average pace was 6:11. Slowed down intentionally after the first mile in order to keep from flaming out early. Anyway, my goal was simply to break twenty minutes, so my relative placement wasn’t so important to me. Good thing, too, 'cause I was beaten out for 2nd AG in the last few yards. (10th overall in 111 runners.)
Based on this experience, I’m wondering whether I should even be trying to negative split for this distance. Maybe should just continue my usual attempt to keep up with one of the lead packs for as long as possible, then just try to hang on as well as I can. I’ll be testing both approaches this year, I think.
Anyway, my previous 5K PR, from a different race last summer, was 20:35. I’m pretty happy to have knocked well over a minute off of it, and would have been amazed if someone had told me last year that I’d be turning up my nose at a sub 20 minute result. It’ll be interesting to see what I can do to improve upon it. I feel like my previous races have demonstrated the effects of decent genetic potential coupled with half-assed training.
Final tally for the 100/100 challenge for me: 100 runs, 480 miles, at an average pace of 8:53/mile. Mileage was just slightly above the median (18/40) of those who finished 100 runs, and probably also near the median for all of those who finished Bronze Club or above. Practically no attempt to run fast during this time, apart from two 5K races, and a very small amount of fartlek or strides now and again, on absolutely no sort of plan or schedule - just did it when the mood struck me and the roads weren’t icy.
First triathlon of the season will be Mooseman in June, but my real “A” races aren’t until July. Meanwhile, will be jumping into as many 5/10Ks as I can.
