Tradition…
My daughter and I get up early on Thanksgiving and run.
The race is the Outback Distance Classic. Masey does the 6k and I do the ½ Marathon.
The night before the race I went out… wine with dinner.. then somehow I found myself sitting in a bar drinking Crown Royal well past midnight… embracing my inner John Young no doubt…
I had a goal… 13 sub 8s… but without any pressure of actually trying to run at any precise pace. The weather this year was a near perfect 50F. Being that we dressed appropriately we huddled close together and shivered while waiting for the race to start.
Once the gun went off we quickly settled into our own races. I could still see Masey just off to my right… and whipped my head around when I saw her heel get kicked in the mass of runners…. She quickly regained her balance and was on her way without incident. Soon thereafter she was lost in the crowd… and at the 1 mile mark the 6k and ½ runners parted ways.
I missed the 1 mile marker which was fine… I didn’t want to know… I heard someone around me comment about 7:30… I felt good… and just wanted to run blissfully unaware of my pace for a while.
During the second mile I passed a lone runner wearing a shirt that said “I’m running with the rockstar on chemo” as I passed I almost commented on the fact that he had lost his star… a couple of minutes later I was happy to have remained silent since… he may have lost this person to cancer… sometimes being shy and reserved keeps me from being recognized as an idiot.
I ran the next few miles with a couple that obviously run a lot… and run together a lot…
I used their conversation as a distraction tho… yet kinda wished I had some music.
I had been taking splits with my Timex but not looking at them. At mile 4 I peeked. It was a 7:35. I was shocked. I thought to myself and may have even said out loud “I’m running out of my mind”. What I know now but did not know then is that mile 4 was the slowest I’d run so far.
With that thought in mind I tried to run the next few miles at a steady pace… but I was beginning to notice that more people passed me than I passed…. But the splits kept coming in at 7:4x so not much to complain about.
By mile 9 I could feel myself slipping… whereas the first few miles had been smooth and seemingly effortless speed I was now turning my legs over by force of will and still slowing down… even if by only 5 or 10 seconds per mile.
Miles 11-13 were all above 8… but only just…
As I rounded the final corner my daughter was waiting there for me… big smile, high five, then a glance at the clock… 1:41:37 is what it read in the distance… I smiled when I knew that I could close the distance and finish under 1:42 gun time…
All in all a good day. A 5 minute or so PR… Masey was happy and we each took 2 naps later in the day.
Splits:
14:48 (miles 1&2)
7:22
7:35
7:44
7:47
7:33
7:56
7:50
8:01
8:11
8:05
My daughter and I get up early on Thanksgiving and run.
The race is the Outback Distance Classic. Masey does the 6k and I do the ½ Marathon.
The night before the race I went out… wine with dinner.. then somehow I found myself sitting in a bar drinking Crown Royal well past midnight… embracing my inner John Young no doubt…
I had a goal… 13 sub 8s… but without any pressure of actually trying to run at any precise pace. The weather this year was a near perfect 50F. Being that we dressed appropriately we huddled close together and shivered while waiting for the race to start.
Once the gun went off we quickly settled into our own races. I could still see Masey just off to my right… and whipped my head around when I saw her heel get kicked in the mass of runners…. She quickly regained her balance and was on her way without incident. Soon thereafter she was lost in the crowd… and at the 1 mile mark the 6k and ½ runners parted ways.
I missed the 1 mile marker which was fine… I didn’t want to know… I heard someone around me comment about 7:30… I felt good… and just wanted to run blissfully unaware of my pace for a while.
During the second mile I passed a lone runner wearing a shirt that said “I’m running with the rockstar on chemo” as I passed I almost commented on the fact that he had lost his star… a couple of minutes later I was happy to have remained silent since… he may have lost this person to cancer… sometimes being shy and reserved keeps me from being recognized as an idiot.
I ran the next few miles with a couple that obviously run a lot… and run together a lot…
I used their conversation as a distraction tho… yet kinda wished I had some music.
I had been taking splits with my Timex but not looking at them. At mile 4 I peeked. It was a 7:35. I was shocked. I thought to myself and may have even said out loud “I’m running out of my mind”. What I know now but did not know then is that mile 4 was the slowest I’d run so far.
With that thought in mind I tried to run the next few miles at a steady pace… but I was beginning to notice that more people passed me than I passed…. But the splits kept coming in at 7:4x so not much to complain about.
By mile 9 I could feel myself slipping… whereas the first few miles had been smooth and seemingly effortless speed I was now turning my legs over by force of will and still slowing down… even if by only 5 or 10 seconds per mile.
Miles 11-13 were all above 8… but only just…
As I rounded the final corner my daughter was waiting there for me… big smile, high five, then a glance at the clock… 1:41:37 is what it read in the distance… I smiled when I knew that I could close the distance and finish under 1:42 gun time…
All in all a good day. A 5 minute or so PR… Masey was happy and we each took 2 naps later in the day.
Splits:
14:48 (miles 1&2)
7:22
7:35
7:44
7:47
7:33
7:56
7:50
8:01
8:11
8:05
1 comment:
Looks like you should be drinking Crown Royal the night before your runs on a regular basis. Nice numbers!
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