The Start
They started the 5Ks and 10Ks together. The start was downhill (which
meant the finish was uphill!). There were a lot of people running this and
quite a few strollers. It was a massive herd of people. Unlike most races where
I can get a good pace at the start, this race there was nowhere to go so I was stuck
at a slower start. Finally we got on the street and I was able to speed up a
bit. I knew going into this race that the course was hilly but I wasn’t quite
prepared for the hills that were to come. I decided to test out the Galloway method
for this race. I run a half mile and
walk a minute. However I refuse to walk a downhill. As a result I ran a lot
during my “walk time” and walked some of the “run time.” The first mile had a
nice downhill as you can see in the elevation chart below. My first mile pace
was 11:40 and that was with a walk break! I was happy with that. There was a
drum line that entertained us during this stretch. That was fun. The second mile had some steep
hills that I tried to run most of them but ended up walking a lot of them. :( Our
first water stop was just before a mile and half marker. I walked through that
even though it was a “run time.” My mile 2 pace dropped to 12:14 but with the
hills and water stop, I’m impressed I only lost 35 seconds. We had a cheer squad for us somewhere along
this mile.
The Middle
Right around mile 2 is where the 5K runners split from us and went up a
hill to their finish. We had to run that
hill eventually but first we had to run 3 more miles of hills. Mile 3 was mostly downhill with a few short
up hills. I gained back some of the time I lost with mile 2 but not much as it
was still 12:09. There was a jazz band playing that was cool. Mile 4 is when it
fell apart for me. I was still doing the run/walk method but my legs were
tired. The downhills seem to always happen during a walk break and like I said
above I don’t walk down hills so than my run breaks would turn into 3/4 miles instead
of a half mile. Maybe that caused my exhaustion too? A week before the race I
did over 6 miles using this method and did great, most of my half mile run
portions were under 6 minutes. That wasn’t the case with this race but I think
that is mostly because I trained on flat surface and this course wasn’t flat at
all. Mile 4 was probably the flattest of the course except for the long up hill
to get to the end of mile 4. This was the worst hill on the course, I think. I’m
not sure there were a couple pretty bad ones. My time for mile 4 was 12:32. There
was a guy playing his guitar and singing on mile 4. He was ok but the jazz band
was better
The Finish
Miles 5 and 6 were constantly going up and down but not really long
hills. You would think I could do well on this but that didn’t happen. Mile 5 had a women singing what sounded like Karaoke.
I think part of my problem with mile 5
was I started out walking when it wasn’t a walk break because I just conquered
the long hill at the end of mile 4. My legs were so mad at me at this point that
I was not too happy. Somewhere was another water stop. I can’t remember
where. Mile 5 came in at just under 13
minutes at 12:58. Mile 6 was worse at 13:09. My hope that I could do better
than my Valleyfair 10K was gone at this point and my main goal now was to finish
strong. I did a lot more walking during mile 6 than I should have but I knew
that the finish was an uphill climb and I wanted my legs to be rested for a
strong finish. I finished with a “sprint” and did the last tenth of a mile in a
minute which is somewhat fast for me considering I was at the end of 6 miles. My finish time was 1:18.29. That was exactly 1
minute slower than Valleyfair’s 10K. I’m disappointed but it was a very hilly course
where Valleyfair was flat. My next true test for the 10K is at the Marine Corps
Marathon at the end of October. My next 10K is in Mankato but it is almost
entirely downhill so that isn’t a fair test.
The Food and Parking
The finish area had plenty of food and water. They had a huge
assortment of potato chips including Fritos and Cheetos! There were Oreos, Rice
Krispy Treats and of course bananas, oranges and apples. It was a good spread.
We made our way to the car and realized we were in for a long wait. The parking
lot exit is onto the race course and we had to sit at least 45 minutes to get
out. It was bad. That was really the only bad thing about this race. Normally
it wouldn’t have been a big deal but we had a hotel 45 minutes away that still
had all our stuff in the room and the checkout time was noon. If we didn’t get
out of the parking lot soon, we would have been in trouble. Thankfully we got
back to the hotel with enough time to take a quick shower and pack up our stuff.
Splits and Pictures
No comments:
Post a Comment