A goal was to smoke the field and break 37 min. B goal was 37:30, C goal was to break 38:03, which was my time from two years ago. I came to the race with all three kiddies and a babysitter. Ben was to run the 5k, Mickie and JJ were running the 1 mile. I left them after getting our numbers and ran 2 miles, up the first mile of the course. I decided the first mile is the stiffest uphill of the whole course. It turns out that it is, when I mapped it on the course tool. Kassi Andersen, Amber Andrews and Julie Thomas at the start, stiff competition. Kassi was wearing Viking woman costume along with four other people, if only she carried a 15 pound morning star weapon I would have stood a chance. Mile 1: 6:05, Stuck behind Kassi, Amber, and yellow shirt girl, head wind, so ran right behind red shirt guy. Travis ran this first mile with me. approx 100 ft elev gain Mile 2: no split (hit stop on my watch instead of split at the 1 mile mark), starts with prob 100 m continued uphill, then long nice downhill, I got behind redshirt guy and took the lead from the ladies so that I could turn how I wanted and use the downhill how I wanted. approx pace is backed into given my other data, in this mile my college Coach was riding to accompany Kassi (presumably). He cheered her on, then told me that if I looked in college how I do now, I'd have made it to nationals--I guess he meant that as a complement (I was only 8 sec off the B standard in the 10k for track on my first attempt at the distance, due to novice-like mistakes). I replied to him that I have unfinished business, then I surged. Kind of stupid, but it was still downhill and I felt good. The 105 ft of net elevation loss in mile 2 might have had something to do with feeling good. Mile 3: approx 5:49, going faster than I planned on this mile, let Amber and Kassi pull away. I thought this was a flat mile, but it turns out it has about 57 ft net loss. Mile 4: 6:05, this is where it gets tough and I wanted to keep 6:00 pace, about the only flat mile Mile 5: 6:11, right after the 4 mile mark, yellow shirt chick blazes by me, I totally should have gone with her. This mile is showing just a 6 ft gain, but it has an uphill, then downhill. Mile 6: 6:22, literally zigzagging through 5k racers, this is so bad in the last mile. The mile also had abt 53 feet of net elevation gain, long uphill to finish. I tried to tell a woman to move over, but of course she was wearing an ipod, so I moved over to the middle of the street, ruining my tangent, but at least I could do a bit less of dodging. Geez. I threw in some surges, trying to keep my pace strong, I think I did better at keeping pace strong in the first half of the sixth mile than the second half (per my garmin). .2 1:11 (6:00 pace), 27 ft net elev gain, I kick in, but unfortunately relax a bit when I see myself coming in at 36:30, it dumbfounded me, but I should have known the clock was wrong. I am so happy to solidly beat my 2008 time. To be slightly better than where I was two years ago is so sweet. I am about 10 mpw short of my training in 2008, and am currently doing less speed/hard workouts. Hopefully I will continue to improve and get to breaking 2:50 zone by Hartford. I am frustrated though that I seem to always race at about 95% capacity, why didn't I try harder and risk more in the 5th mile? Why did I let the 5kers get to me in the 6th mile? Why didn't I kick harder? I need to go from 95% to 100% effort. Not sure how. Practice? I didn't do some sports psychology things I could have with myself in this race which could have helped. Hmm.
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