I ran my first 8k cross country race a few weeks ago, started with a 5:24 first mile then faded to finish with 28:24. I was a bit upset with myself for going out there so foolishly (no way I was gonna keep that pace up), and I'm thinking about running the invite on the same course this next weekend.
I did a sort of "tempo run" earlier today; for one, to make sure my knee didn't bother me (which it didn't) and also to try out a negative split technique. I did the run in splits of 5:51, 5:48, 5:37, and 5:01. The first three miles were pretty comfortable, and the last was close to all-out. After I finished I started thinking about how painful that run would've been if I'd done those miles in reverse order.
Now I'd really like to get under 28 on my next race, and I was wondering if starting out at slower than my goal pace (5:36) would be a good way to accomplish that. All I remember from my last race is that those last miles were very painful, probably because my body still wanted to recover from that hard (for me) first mile. So would it be wise to aim for about 5:40 on my first couple miles and then try to make up the difference on the last ones, or is that just a dumb strategy (considering most college runners don't do negative splits I believe)?