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Week 109
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Greetings 50+ers from the soggy central US. Intentionally took it down quite a bit this week with a total of 33 miles in six days of running.
Sun: 6 easy-ish
Mon: 0 tired
Tue: 4.2 w/2@6:20 pace + post-run
Wed: 6 very easy w/5 80-m strides
Thur: 8 w/10k @36:56 (splits:548,600,614,602,554,544,75)
Fri: 3 easy + post-run
Sat: 6 easy
Only notable thing to talk about is the 10k race. So here’s a report:
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I felt that I’d done a good job preparing this week: dropping the miles, including a little (but not taxing) speed, and then a lot of stop-n-stretch stuff on Wednesday. The taper was good, but I wish I’d managed a little more sleep, as I was only getting about 6 hrs of sleep (at best) each night from Sunday onward. Such is life.
Race day, I awoke at 5am to do my pre-race ritual: a little peanut-butter and jelly toast and a couple cups of coffee to get my day started. Race time was 7:30 under the threat of rain w/possible thunderstorms, a persistent state that we’ve been in going on three weeks now (and still no end in sight!) So race time temps were a modest 68 degrees, but the humidity was very high with overcast skies. I arrived downtown at about 6:50 and did about 3/4-mile worth of warm-up with some easy strides.
There looked to be a good number of 15:xx 5k runners that I’d recognized, but no really big guns; they were all up in Frankfort (as I noted in my previous post). I was happy to bide time small-talking with a lot of my buddies prior to the race and I felt pretty loose and ready to run relaxed. I started a row or two back, and when the gun went off (they use a Kentucky long rifle to start the race), I didn’t get going nearly as quickly as the young’uns. Rolling down Main Street I found myself running smoothly, but probably back around 50th as we made the first bend. As we headed north past the courthouses up towards Transylvania University, there always seems to be some guys who fall off that’d gone out way too fast, so I steadily picked off runners up this upgrade but I tried to keep it controlled. The field had pretty much settled into order and pace by the time we hit the mile mark in 5:48 and headed back towards Main St. By this point, it had started to drizzle a bit, making the roads a tad slick. I was aiming for 6-minute miles, so this was a little fast, and the second mile saw me hit that target on the nose. A buddy of mine and his son passed me (they had started a few more rows back, but on their best days are both significantly faster than me), and I decided to just run with them in my sights, as I thought that would lead to a good time for me. We headed out of downtown with a deceptive uphill along East Main St. and in following them, I failed to sense that we had fallen off the pace and slowed to 6:14 for mile three.
Everyone pretty much maintained order as the race now headed further out Main St. along a downhill section. I pushed the pace a bit to get us back on track, and all the group followed me and then overtook me again along this long downhill stretch. At the furthest (and lowest) point, we U-turn to head back towards downtown as the drizzle turned to light rain. I lost all momentum at the U-turn as I feared slipping and falling. Even so, we hit the 4 mile mark back on pace with a 6:02 mile. At this point, we have to go back up the long incline, and this is where I’ve typically started to fade. This long upgrade usually takes the wind out of my sail and it’s all I can do to bring it home. Don’t know why, but this year was different; I actually felt strong and started to pick up the pace up the incline. I passed my buddy and his son, and a few others as we crested the hill and started the long decent into downtown---I hit the 5-mile mark with a 5:54 mile.
The final 1.2 miles really seems to drag on, as you can almost see the finish line from this far out. We just keep rolling and rolling and rolling past all the walkers who still heading out of town. I’d picked it up more along this soft downhill stretch, but that didn’t allow me to hold off a couple of teenagers who just have more leg-speed than this old dog. We finally hit downtown back at the start with about .4 miles to the finish. We ran the 6th mile in 5:44, but my legs were now about dead as we still had 0.2 miles to go. The kids all had some kick left and easily pulled away from me, including my buddy’s son; I managed to hold steady and hit the finish line at 36:56 (~85.7% age-grade---I’m 53.8 years old, do I include the .8?) about a minute ahead of my expectations, and 30s ahead of my best hopes. Most of that 30s came from a significant negative split: 18:40 first 5k, 18:16 second 5k. Needless to say, I was pleased with the result (19th overall, 2nd master…41-y.o. Glen Mays finished 2nd overall in 33:04, but with no double-dipping, I was awarded the masters plaque), but more importantly, I feel my training has gotten back on track since the less-than-stellar spring. It bodes well for the rest of the summer heading into fall, assuming I can stay healthy and not do something stupid---I’ll try to follow these three P’s: principled, persistent, patient. We'll see how it goes.
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I’ll repeat my kudos to all that got in races over this 4th of July. I’d love to hear your stories.
Dave, you constantly amaze me; that’s one helluva 8-mile run!
Edgewood, I’d love to hear your report from the Peachtree!
AK, my 49-y.o. marathon-running buddy flew up to your majestic state and broke 3-hours at your Mayor’s Marathon the other week.
Have a great week, all!