The new year is most certainly upon us, and I wanted to jumpstart my 31 in 31 challenge with a race to kick the year off. Last year, I tackled more races and longer distances than I ever had before. I managed to complete 3 ultra-marathons, 4 marathons, and a host of half-marathons and other various races. I logged over 2100 miles! I’m not much for competition with others when it comes to my racing, but you can bet I’m plenty competitive with myself so I now have a number to shoot for this year amidst my training.
After my last race of 2012, I decided that I wanted to take my training in a new direction and commit to increasing my speed as well as my endurance. I started being more intentional with my speed work and hill training, and am hoping to break 4 hours for the first time at the Little Rock Marathon on March 3rd. As my speed has increased, it occurred to me that my mile and 5K times will probably improve as well. Thus, the Resolution Run 5K in West Des Moines was a great barometer for my current training, and it also happened to be a fun New Years day morning trip with friends!
Luckily, the race didn’t start until 10:00AM. Clearly, the organizers understood the nature of the beast and elected to give people a chance to sleep in a bit more after a long New Years Eve. In total, there were only about 280 participants, but the starting line was set up on a sidewalk so there was a considerable bottleneck as we got going. It probably took me a good quarter of a mile to work my way around folks and to my desired pace, but from there, I didn’t look back! The route was mostly sidewalks, and there was still a fair amount of snow and nice on the ground, so I was still a bit hesitant as I watched my footing. The last thing I needed was to twist an ankle or sprain my knee (which was already a bit sore from running on snow and ice around town).
This was my first 5K race since this past summer, but I still remembered tanking on the third mile. Granted, that had more to do with the 18 previous miles I had on my legs that day, but it was still fresh in my mind. However, my legs continued to feel great. I clocked in at 7:34 after the first mile, and finished the second mile in 7:32. When I crossed the finished line in 20:55, I couldn’t have been more happy! Then I looked at my distance.
I had only run 2.8 miles! The race was short…ugh. I was certainly disappointed with this realization, but I knew that even with another 3/10 of a mile, I would have still PR’d by a considerable amount. I may not be able to log my 20:55 as an official 5K time, but I am still extremely happy with the result. The year is certainly off to a great start!
