My legs were feeling a little achy this morning so I was actually a little bit nervous. I did the normatec before the warmup to try to help that out as well, even though I had done it yesterday.
2 mile warm up
3:55 for 1500m
Splits (first 300m, then the 3 400m splits after that): 46, 1:04, 1:03, 1:00 (there were some decimals in there so that added up the extra 2 seconds)
Was near the back of the pack after the start but everyone was bunched pretty tight so it wasn't a concern and I was on the inside so I wasn't running extra. Not including the last lap, every time I made a pass it was actually on the inside because they were running more in the middle or outside of lane 1 so I squeezed by on the left. That probably won't happen often but it was very nice and probably happened 3 or 4 times within the first 800. At I think the 800m mark I was in 2nd actually and I think Mark was in 3rd behind me. At 400 left Mark took the lead and started to go so I went around the other guy at that point. I wanted to try to go with Mark, but he gapped me pretty good on the backstretch. But I was staying locked in and still going as fast as I could. I do think I was able to close the gap a little bit the last 200 but he already had built a pretty good lead on me. Overall I was pretty happy with the race, I had no idea what to expect time wise and it was cool to see how good my speed had improved just from having a good base. My high school mile pr is a 4:26. In all honestly it was probably the best race I've had since being back from the mission.
The things I am finding most helpful for me mentally duirng a race are to just try to turn my mind off and not really think at all (a neutral thought is far more powerful than a negative one and you can only have one thought in your mind at a time) and to not ever lead the race at all until it's time to make my move (and when I make my move just fully commit). I felt like it helped me mentally to distract from the pain and how I was feeling when I could just focus on the person(s) in front of me and focus on staying with them. When I watched the race afterwards there was actually a few things I didn't quite remember haha. After crossing the line it felt good when Mark turned around and could see I was the first one there behind him to finish. And a minute or two after the race I realized I didn't feel very good and then I threw up.
Then did an 11 mile cooldown with Mark and Ben which was pretty tiring but it was fun.
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