Tuesday, April 01, 2008

Scotland Run

I ran another 10K on Sunday. Another cold one. The day was nice, but at race time the temperature was 37 degrees. As Sara pointed out, we've been running races since December, and they've all been at the same temperature!

It was unbelievably crowded. 6,928 finishers! It's no wonder they'll be starting a corral system soon.

As I've mentioned recently, I haven't been feeling too fast. Workouts have been tough. When the race started I didn't try and weave too much as I wasn't too worried about my time. I ended up running the first mile in 8:12, which was faster than it felt.

By the second mile, some space had opened up. I hit the 2nd mile marker in 7:28. I was surprised. Right about then I realized that I had - of course - forgotten to check my PR before the race that morning. (Why do I always do that!) So I had no idea if that was good, or if I had a chance to set a new PR.

I kept up the pace for the next mile, and finished it in 7:26. I was really hurting, and my mind was trying all sorts of rationalizations to get me to stop and slow down. I refused to give in and just kept pushing. I felt really beat and couldn't speed up as I've done in previous races, but I refused to slow down.

I finished the 4th mile in 7:45. A little slower, but it didn't feel it. Maybe there was a hill there, or the mile marker was off, because I was hanging in there. In any case, I guess it spurred me on to pick it up. The next mile went by in 7:30. I was really wiped, but I knew there was just over 1 mile to go, so I picked up the pace. I hit the 6th mile marker in 7:11. Nice! At this point, I sprinted for the last 0.2 miles. It was really killer, but I pushed through. My watch said 1:27 for these last 0.2 miles, which is a 7:15 pace, but that makes no sense. It was definitely faster.

In any case, my final time was 47:00 on the button, for a 7:34 pace. Turns out, that's a 23 second PR! I know I can do better, but I'll take it for now.

4 Comments:

Blogger Lisa said...

That's great!

Wednesday, April 02, 2008  
Blogger ShoreTurtle said...

Great job Dan.

I will print out a list of your race PRs--call me next time that you're at a race. I'll hook you up with the info.

Wednesday, April 02, 2008  
Blogger David H. said...

that's awesome. the unexpected things are always the best!

Wednesday, April 02, 2008  
Blogger Darrell said...

Type A, always pushing for more. Nice race, and here I thought you were across the pond for a second.

Tag your it!

Monday, April 07, 2008  

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