GT350H
Saturday, November 1, 2008
Hartselle All Saints' Day 5K
Exercise: After getting a massage yesterday for a very sore quad muscle, I was a little apprehensive as to my ability to go all out in this new, certified 5K in Hartselle, AL. After a short warmup (1.49m), we started. As usual, lots of runners started out way too fast. I started picking them off around the 1/3 mile marker. Ahead of me were Dallas Malone (UAH X-Country), Donald Bowman, Eric Shotz, Andy Davidson (UAH X-Country), and 3 other guys I did not recognize. The course was reasonably flat but had at least 12 turns of 90 degrees or more. The mile markers were not in the right places (first one registered 0.82 miles on my Garmin), so I used my own GPS to gauge distance. On a very cool morning I hit the first mile in 5:58. Right at this point I passed two of the unknown runners and tried to tuck in behind Eric Schotz as I knew he has been running really well (mid 18's) lately.
Entering downtown Hartselle, we made a sharp right after the steepest downhill, then another right that lead up the only steep hill on the whole course. I felt myself slowing a little and glanced down at my Garmin seeing that I was at 6:28 per mile pace. Remembering what I read in Runner's World last week (that sometimes you are not really tired, your brain just sends out signals to your muscles in preparation for fatigue, telling them to slow down) - I tried to push trough that tired feeling that I usually get between miles 2 and 3 in 5K races lately. I hit mile two in 6:10, still putting me under 19:00 pace. Mile 3 repeated our loop through the football stadium parking lot. I was gaining a little on the last unknown runner and could still see Eric up ahead. I was still pushing hard as we left the stadium parking lot and made two sharp turns and headed up an incline back toward the Start/Finish. Mile 3 came in 6:05, still putting me under 19:00 pace. At this point I knew I HAD to maintain and push through the finish - although I hit the last 0.1 in a rather slow 0:41, I was able to cross the line in 18:57, first in age group and sixth overall. Donald Bowman was first male master, Madelyn Patton was first female master.
It's taken over a year of training to finally sneak back into the sub-19 range in a 5K, but doing it two of the last three races is encouraging. I'm thinking the Eric Charette/Joey Butler "smackdowns" are finally paying off.
Total mileage for week: 5.99
Total mileage for month : 5.99
Entering downtown Hartselle, we made a sharp right after the steepest downhill, then another right that lead up the only steep hill on the whole course. I felt myself slowing a little and glanced down at my Garmin seeing that I was at 6:28 per mile pace. Remembering what I read in Runner's World last week (that sometimes you are not really tired, your brain just sends out signals to your muscles in preparation for fatigue, telling them to slow down) - I tried to push trough that tired feeling that I usually get between miles 2 and 3 in 5K races lately. I hit mile two in 6:10, still putting me under 19:00 pace. Mile 3 repeated our loop through the football stadium parking lot. I was gaining a little on the last unknown runner and could still see Eric up ahead. I was still pushing hard as we left the stadium parking lot and made two sharp turns and headed up an incline back toward the Start/Finish. Mile 3 came in 6:05, still putting me under 19:00 pace. At this point I knew I HAD to maintain and push through the finish - although I hit the last 0.1 in a rather slow 0:41, I was able to cross the line in 18:57, first in age group and sixth overall. Donald Bowman was first male master, Madelyn Patton was first female master.
It's taken over a year of training to finally sneak back into the sub-19 range in a 5K, but doing it two of the last three races is encouraging. I'm thinking the Eric Charette/Joey Butler "smackdowns" are finally paying off.
Total mileage for week: 5.99
Total mileage for month : 5.99
posted by mgreene at 12:59 PM
1 Comments:
Hey Mike, I finished 2nd in our age group but you were way ahead of me (although my time was about 10 seconds off my PR of 22:36). Nice job
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