Really fun race, though not pancake flat like I hoped. I will write details later.
I won 150 Euros - almost enough to pay for dinner tonight :)
Ok, so a thousand Information Systems geeks have descended on this hotel and have hogged the wifi bandwidth, so the internet crawls and is unstable in normal hours now. But it is 5:20 am and I can't sleep anymore, so this is my long version:
The night before the race, they had a paella party which they invited us to for free, and they had someone pick us up from our hotel for it. His name was Sayed (sp?) and he didn't speak English, and we do not speak French, but he speaks Spanish, and we speak enough to be somewhat conversant with him. He was a very kind gentleman. The car ride was about 35 minutes. The table we sat at at the party had no english speakers (supposedly) but we did speak enough for them to ask us how we felt about Obama and we gave them a big thumbs up on that. There was a table for the Kenyan runners, which made my stomach turn. Chocolate eclair with chocolate mousse inside for dessert. Sayed said he would take us through downtown Paris, which should take 5-10 minutes longer than the other way, to give us a look at some of the sights by night. Well, he gave us the GRAND tour, took us all the way around the cities to see Notre Dame lit up at night, through the Louvre (driving illegally at one point, telling us to close our eyes to his driving), past the opera house, on the Champs Ellyses and the Arc de Triumph, and then finally to our hotel, 1 hour and 20 minutes from when we started our tour. He was so kind to do that for us. It has been very cold here, so a tour in a car at night was very welcome. I have to say the drivers here are very crazy, but there is little honking and next to no anger. They have fewer rules, their roundabouts seem lawless, but they don't get their feathers ruffled - must be all the wine gets them in a good mood.
Got to bed pre race day at 11pm, woke up at 8:20. Race starts at 11:40. The hotel's breakfast is very elaborate and free, but I stuck to toast, some fruit and a wheat roll. I stopped drinking about 2 hours before the race. We left for the subway at 9:50 and got to the race by 10:30, there were thousands of people to participate in the races (10,000 the organizers said, about 2500-3000 in my race). The veteran (masters men got their own race) race started at 10:40, and I did 3k with that race as part of my warm up. I got access to a locker room that only the elite women used (I saw about 5 women) and a bathroom, so that was sweet. I did strides and stretching while hoping my gps watch would pick up reception but it never did. Luckily on the bus I had calculated in my head what the 1k splits would need to be for 5:50 pace - 3:38. So I kept splits for the first 5k, although my split recorder on the watch didn't seem to work either.
At the start, there was a place for the elites, then everyone else. They announced my name and my country at the start. Cool! No pressure! There were about 10-15 ladies in the elite section, including at least two Kenyan ladies, who were in low 30's shape, so I was staring around and saying, I have to beat most of these white chicks to get money (money for top 5). It made me nervous. It was a cloudy day and threatening to rain, but not as cold, so I wore shorts and a long sleeve shirt (blog shirt of course), but the other ladies were wearing more technical clothes in general so that didn't instill confidence in me. There were a line of volunteers across the starting line, and they all went at once, which looked to me and a couple of other runners like the race had started so we went, but it wasn' t the start of the race, which was apparent within seconds, and we had to sheepishly turn around and go back to the start. At least I wasn't alone, but my fear of a false start because of the language barrier came to pass. Oh well. The start happened minutes after (turns out those volunteers went early to run the course, leading the way for us). The course is a three loop course, but the second and third loops add a steep hill up and down (about 400m each way) Here's the race:
1k - 3:33, I start out with a little pack of women, with the two Kenyans ahead of us, but by the end of 1k it was me and a french woman with a scarf on her head, slightly uphill, so a fast start
2k - 3:34, mostly flat, scarf woman and I keep trading places, I learn I am third/fourth woman here
3k - 3:31, slight downhill (completing a loop), still trading places with scarf woman
4k - 3:42, slight uphill, slight panic that pace has dropped off, and I let scarf woman gap me by about 5 sec, bad move, now in fourth
5k - 3:36, flat, much better pace, 17:56 for 5k, earning me a PR for a road race inside a 10k sweet, but I know the 2nd half will be harder because I am coming up on the hill for the first time, scarf lady is now 10 or so seconds ahead.
6k - started to rain (cold rain) which continued through the end, no splits from now on, just focusing on effort - uphill
7k - downhill, done with 2nd loop, pass some guys, start to have lots of traffic from the hundreds of people I lap.
8k - trying to catch blue shirt guy who is right in the middle between me and scarf lady,
9k catch monsr. blue shirt on the last hill, as I crest hill, and start downhill notice the 9k mark, and start booking it down the hill.
10k - pretty strong finish, 36:38, but didn't catch scarf lady
In retrospect, I wish I hadn't let the #3 girl go. Paul was cheering me on at one location where he saw me three times, and he said the #2 girl was hurt (she said after the race she was having hamstring problems). Paul said #2 wasn't that far from #3. While in the race I felt like I was working hard (granted, I did have weak parts and had to surge to wake myself up a couple of times), but after the race I didn't feel like I had run a race, at least not to the point of dry heaving or anything. I think I could have done better, but I also think I did well. I wanted to break 37:00, and try to break 36:30, and I came close to that harder goal, so I am happy overall.
Highlights were the french folk cheering me on, most in french, but every once and a while in english, and of course the santa race after my race, which included hundreds dressed as santa, some christmas trees and reindeer, a smurf, some ghost busters, a guy without a shirt and with long hair dressed as Jesus with a cross on his back. So cool to watch. The race workers were so kind and helpful to me, and I needed their help so I appreciated it alot. They gave Paul a t-shirt as well as me, so that was cool. Check's in the mail!
PS my legs did feel sore and like they had raced by evening, and it's funny to be glad that I am sore. It's like validation that I didn't wuss out too bad in the race. | 