The race started at 8:00am at Crosby Farm Park in St. Paul, about 15 minutes from our house. Not being a morning person, and most certainly not being a morning exerciser (I think my heart and lungs actually protest doing extra work before 10am) I got up at 5:45am to ensure I had plenty of time to wake up before the race. I had a small bowl of oatmeal, honey, and berries and started drinking a bottle of water. I proceeded to round up my gear and then took the dogs on a walk.
By the time I got back, and dressed, it was time to get David up and mobilized. After he gets himself ready, and I go to the bathroom for the 3rd time that morning, we leave the house, at 7:20am.
We get there, park, and check-in fairly uneventfully. After scoping out the course-map we believe we are going to have to run up a huge hill at the 5 mile mark of the race. I'm a little concerned about it, and think to myself how that might change my strategy, but I don't have too much time to dwell on it because soon we have to head to the starting line where the other runners are beginning to congregate.
I look around me, and it seems as though every runner there is dressed as if they are about to PR on a marathon- they were fitted out in compression socks and sleeves, running belts, GPS watches, dry-fit everything, with energy- bites in their hands. I turn to David and say if this is how all races are, I don't ever want to do this again. David thought it was motivating, wanting to beat all the people who thought they needed every running gadget to run a race, whereas it just made me more nervous.
Now David leaves me and goes to his spot in the top third or so of the pack, while I go stand in almost the very back. The announcer starts telling us a bunch of info, none of which I can hear way in the back, and before I know it we are off.
Now I knew I would start off slow- because I always start my long runs slow, and because I am not a morning runner and my body does not like moving like that early in the morning. Between that, the fact that I thought I had a large hill looming in front of me, and the knowledge that I had never run a race that long before, I took off perhaps around an 11-minute/ mile pace or slower. I picked 2 women and stayed between 6-15 feet behind them for the first 5 miles. Even when I felt like I could go faster, I had decided that I was going to go slow until this hill, at the halfway mark, and then speed up if I still felt good. I was also nervous that I would hurt my knees, as occasionally on my longer runs, around the 7 mile mark, I would get anywhere from dull to a strong pain in my knees.
We get to the 4 mile mark, and I have no idea where I am at this point- we have left the river and made a bunch of turns, and I just assume the hill is always around the next bend, although it didn't seem like we were anywhere near it. We hit the 5 mile mark and now it seems like we are up above the big hill- there is a water station up ahead, and since I was carrying a bottle and did not need to pull over, I decided now was my chance to pick up the pace. I blow through the station, passing 10 or so people who had passed me, and catch up to a middle-aged man, who makes a comment to me about the hills. After a little chatting we decide we are not going to have to go up that big one after all, so I wrap things up with him, and keep to my slightly-faster pace, determined not to be passed by anyone I blew by at the water station.
Now I am finally starting to think this is fun. I catch up to what appeared to be a father-daughter running pair, and follow them for the next 3 miles. Around 8.5 miles I start seeing finishers walking back down the course with bananas and water in hand and I feel a little extra motivational push. Either the father-daughter pair was slowing down, or I was ready to be done, because around 8.5 miles I decide to pass them. We hit the 9 mile mark, which I swear took forever to get to, and I was starting to regret increasing my speed so early, but I kept pushing on. I then decided I was going to get one song into the last mile and then do my last big push.
I had Chumbawamba's "I Get Knocked Down" going on repeat at this point- not my first choice pump-up song, but I thought it was probably going to work better than the next 5-6 I would run across in shuffle mode. A few more minutes pass and I spy a few more people up in front of me I think I can pass, so I pick up the pace again. I pass one guy, then hold just about even with another until I get about 150 yards short of the finish. I pull up beside him, he wishes me good luck, I smile, then pull ahead. Next in front of me, by maybe 50 yards, is a middle-aged woman (pictured below), she doesn't seem to have much of a kick left, so I'm confident I can catch her.
I kick-it up a notch one last time and push to catch her. Now it is almost straight-away to the finish. I pull up beside the woman, see the time on the clock- 1:40:27 - almost exactly 10 minute miles, which was a loose goal I had set, and muster a near sprint.
I crossed the finish at 1:40:38. Finishing 71/105 woman. David finished in 1:15:17, 39/117 men (clearly he had enough time to grab the camera to snag these pics).
I catch my breath, stretch, grab so food, etc, and we head home.
Now David is convinced the race was under 10 miles, his I-pod said it was closer to 9.25, and he is certain he could not have run 10 miles as fast as he did, based on how fast he ran his training runs (even though the Google map of the course says it was 10). So if it wasn't a full 10 miles, I am slightly disappointed in my time, even though my only real goal was to run the entire thing. However, I did pick up speed as I went, and wouldn't be surprised if my last mile was between 8:30-9 minutes. Now I just need to learn how to start out faster- a good goal for the half marathon we hope to run in August.
After completing my first competitive race (the trail-run we did in Grand Marais was so laid-back, it doesn't really compare to the race we just ran, which was still fairly low-key with only slightly more than 200 runners), I think it is safe to say I had a good time and would look forward to another race. However I don't think it is something I want to pay to do often- 1 or 2 longer races a summer seems like a good amount for the future. It was fun to run a new course and to have more to think about while running- for example, I kept track of the net people I passed during the race. But at the end of the day, it is still running, which I can do for free, around the scenic lakes or parkway, any day.
great job!
ReplyDeletethanks!
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