http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v377/robisch/Mothers%20Day%2008/?albumview=slideshow
Yesterday, I ran a local 5K, the Mission of Mercy Run for MOM in Frederick. The morning here in Maryland was quite rainy, but I decided that I didn't care about a little rain. I figured anything that might lower the turnout might give me a better shot at placing in my age group!
Well, fortunately, the rain started to let up right as we were starting. There were 89 runners, and for the first time in a long while, a very long while, I stepped up near the start line for a race. I was hoping to take a legitimate stab at a very old PR of mine for the 5K. I believe that's from the 1987 Bastille Day 5K in Chicago, where I managed a 6:59 pace for roughly a 21:38 time. However, based on training runs, I didn't think that I was quite back to running a 7 min pace for 3 miles. My more reasonable goal was breaking 22 minutes, which I haven't done in probably about..., well, since that Bastille Day!
I knew many of the other runners, and my strategy was to try to shadow my friend Tim, who runs between 20 and 21 minute 5Ks almost like clockwork, for as long as possible. I figured I'd rather start too fast than too slow. I was thinking I'd shoot for a 6:50 or so first mile.
Well, the horn blows and we're off! I took off fairly fast and quickly found myself in the unusual position ( for me ) of being fairly near the front, like AHEAD of the bell curve, not TRAILING it! After the first few hundred yards - and no sign of Tim yet - I become alarmed. OMG what if Tim's taking it easy for some reason? He was my pacer! The alarm was short lived, however, as Tim soon came up and passed me. Whew! So I tucked in behind him.
I think I stayed with Tim for the first mile. 6:37. Faster than I wanted, but during that mile the couple of times I checked my GPS I was going faster than expected. I felt okay so I tried to maintain that pace. A half mile later I was beginning to drop off of that pace, and Tim was pulling away. The rest of the way was simply a struggle to keep my pace as fast as possible. Mile 2 was about 7:28. Mile 3 was 7:26. My kick at the finish was fairly weak, for me, and I finished at 22:08. That got me 5th in my age group, and 17th overall out of 89 (top 20%). And a stat that I've notice Jerry (from the MCM forum) frequently notes: one woman finished ahead of me (in 16th) place. Top 20% is really good for me! It was cool to actually be ahead of most of the other runners for a change. An odd thing, that.
Not a PR, but this was a solid 5K time for me that I haven't seen in many years, so I'll take it! Next 5K, look for me to challenge that old PR!
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