Ran this race with Alex ... 40 degrees & 20 mph winds After a 6:00 1st mile into a headwind, it was hard to 'race' the rest of the race! 5:57, 6:32, 6:26, 5:30 pace over last 0.17 per Garmin ... 19:52, 6:16 AP by Garmin
Not very happy with performance, but considering it would have been a 40 second PR over what I ran 10 months ago, sometimes you just have to keep things in perspective! The other positive is that although I kinda went into oxygen debt and was aerobically struggling miles 2 & 3 ... I did not feel like I was pushing that hard ... I'll take a 6:30 pace any day of the week when I do not feel like I am running at race effort!
If I could do it over, I would have started with a 6:30 mile, but what the heck, you might as well run the first mile to give you a chance at a PR, whether it is wise or not. 5k's are brutal, anyway you look at it, there just is not enough time to really make up for a slower start ... so you have to either roll the dice or lower expectations going into them! Alex dropped off at the 1 mile mark, I tried to slow enough for him to catch me (I needed to slow down anyway), but I somehow missed seeing him at the half turnaround, so after a quick water stop right after the turnaround, I started back up ... he said he was close ... and finished strong about 30 seconds behind me. Considering he has not run all winter due to playing basketball, his time was very respectable. It was good for him to realize the dividends that regular training produced when he was running cross country in the fall. He is playing soccer now, so he will stay fit, and hopefully when that ends we can start ramping him up for a sub 18 next fall!
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