Oh yeah! Look out baby, I'm back on the racing scene!
First and foremost, I have no recollection about the last time I participated in a "race." I suppose I could look it up but actually, I don't care. Mostly, I went to this one (The Boulderthon 5K) for the fun of being AT/IN a race. And lo and behold, it WAS fun.
This all begins back in June and July when my weekly mileage crept up to the forties and even three weeks over 50. This increase in fitness originated in two places: 1) better eating habits was causing (or at least supporting) weight loss, and 2) my knee, oddly, responded better to uphills and downhills but did not like the flats. In the end, I had dropped in a nice 13 week build up in mileage. Then, I got greedy.
I was in the Bay Area the week of July 15 got in a 9 mile effort in the Marin Headlands and followed the next day with a run that ended on a 1.6 mile steep uphill (to my Brother-in-Law John's house). Flight home was stiff and sore. Adding to that in the previous days were Bayou Gulch (all hills), The Palmer Trail Loop #16 in the Springs, and some others and BAM! Broken knee.
The cost was two weeks of barely running at all, plus another two weeks at 25-35 miles. But then, I got on the roll once again. Consistent mileage in the 40s with only the occasional sore day created optimism for the future (and optimism is always good). So, the "race."
The Boulderthon 5K was set in downtown Boulder starting and finishing on Pearl Street. The first mile plus (maybe 1.3) was a slight downhill. The rest of it minus the last .1 was a gradual UPhill. Everyone was sent off in waves and I tucked myself back into wave 11 with some walkers, stroller pushing people, and people like me who were just strolling without pushing anything other than their bodies. It was really the perfect place. Most everyone in our group went out too fast and that made for fun in the second half of the race picking them off one by one.
I had a three tiered goal setup. The C goal was to finish without any kind of knee incident. The B goals was to run under 42 minutes (roughly 13:30 ish). And the A goal was to break 40.
None of this is dazzling, even by my standards. My PR (long, long ago) is 15:09. My 45+ year old PR is 18:14. So, 40 minutes was not going to get me too excited. But it did.
40 minutes equals 12:52 pace ORRRRR a minute per mile faster than my pace for what I would consider a good training session. Most of my runs hover between 13:45 and 14:30. For now, I would take that. SO, I run/race.
Most of the way, I felt pretty good. I had one moment where I thought my knee was complaining but it barely lasted only 10-15 seconds. The rest of the time, I felt like I was moving pretty well. The finish, the last .1 was downhill, more downhill than the start (meaning a bit steeper). I worried about that a tad as I hit 10 minute pace there and wondered what my knee would think (it thought, yeah baby!).
Final time on my watch 40:01!
WHAT?????? 40:01? No way. Well, MAYBE the official/chip time would be 39:59. So, I waited...
all freakin' day.....
40:02. NOOOOOOOO!
That's okay. Still fun.
Look out baby!
