Beautiful day for a race. Not too cool, not too hot. The long and the short on the day was that I qualified for Boston by 3 seconds. I ran a good race but possibly could have run a smarter race.
The first 6.5 miles was due North. My 10K split was 49:08. I was running with Birget from New Smyrna Beach who had a 3:35 PR and was looking to do 3:30.
At the turn around we were staying in the mid 7:40's to low 7:50's which felt very comfortable however faster than my race plan. In the first half I had 8 miles under 7:50. My game plan was to stay between 7:50 and 7:55...
At the half my time was 1:43:00 and I felt like the King of the World!!! We had picked up Mark P (faithful running mentor and training partner who came all the way to Cocoa just to pace me through the last half) and a couple of 100 lbs. girls who were barely breaking a sweat. We were in this tight group kind of cruising along and soaking in the crowd, the music, the beautiful down town strip. I made the mistake of handing my shirt off to Mark (who then ran it to the car and headed back out to catch up with us). I felt so good my next two miles were 7:31 & 7:41. When Mark finally caught back up to us he reminded me that we still had a long way to go and that I should save some for the last 10K.
Mile 20 I crossed at 2:37:24 (7:52 avg). At this point I'm still feeling confident although not as excited about the final 10k as I had anticipated just 5 miles ago. At mile 15 I couldn't wait to get to the 20 mile mark. I wanted to smoke the last 6.2 miles with my new found super human strength. Now that I've reached the 20 I'm thinking more serene and gentle thoughts. I noticed that Birget has been in front of me for several minutes now and I just can't get up the steam to catch her and stay with her. At mile 21 I'm beginnig to wonder just how far 5 miles actually is. My splits begin to weaken...
- Off Prev Off Pace
- 20 - 8:08 (+ :16) ( :08)
- 21 - 8:15 (+ :07) ( :15)
- 22 - 8:25 (+ :10) ( :25)
- 23 - 8:43 (+ :18) ( :43)
- 24 - 9:06 (+ :23) (1:06)
- 25 - 9:14 (+ :08) (1:14)
- 26 - 9:02 (- :12) (1:02)
- 385 - 7:04 Approximately 4:53 off 8 min pace lost in the last 10K
The last 10k I was struggling to keep from walking. I felt like I had nothing left in the tank. Nothing cramped. Nothing necessarily hurt (although my feet were blistered pretty badly). I just didn't have anything left. I felt so helpless trying to catch up to Mark who was trying ever so politely to not allow me to quit or throw my BQ effort away with so little distance left. After much prayer, prodding from Mark, and counting to 100 about a dozen times, I finally saw the 26 mile marker and realized I was almost home. I began my surge to the finish around the 720 degree circle of doom! This park in which we finished had this fancy pergola type structure which was built in a large circle around a grassy court yard. I guess they wanted to use every last inch of it because the finish line was all the way around the back side. When I finally crossed the finish line it took me several seconds to stop my watch so I though I missed Boston by 2 seconds. At that point I really could have cared less...
The day was a win no matter how bad I felt in the end. I can't wait till the next race and the chance to break 3:30. I'm convinced that I can but I need to get my mile back up, stay uninjured for the entire training cycle, and run a little bit more conservatively for the first 18 miles. I would really like to finish racing not just staggering to the finish line.
THANKS to Mark P for being there so patiently for all of the training runs and call in questions about everything from pace to nutrition, and for constantly telling me that I could do this. Next time, hopefully, it won't be such a close call.
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