51F, SSE 22-31 mph. no kidding.
Short version - Really happy with this one given the wind. When I felt the wind before the race, I thought it might take a miracle to break 1:30, but it actually happened. No telling what this time would be worth on a normal day (and I'm not gonna guess) but I think I'm right on track with my fitness.
Obviously the splits are all over the map with the wind. The headwind legs mostly came up front and were absolutely brutal. When it gusted, it felt like I would almost come to a complete stop. The tailwind legs were fast, although the damage had already been done. Here are the splits/commentary, with HW in red, crosswind in black and TW in green (although I'm sure it'll be obvious).
1 - 6:52 - It started out with a little loop, and I stuck with the 2 leaders.
2-5 - 6:51, 7:27, 7:21, 7:29 - Mile 2 was neutral until about 1.6 and then the hell started. When I felt what the headwind was like, knowing that we would have to endure it for 4 miles, I almost mentally gave up. The two leaders hammered it and I was left by myself. I was completely smoked trying to hold 7:20s and thought I was done.
6-10 - 6:48, 6:53, 6:41, 6:35, 6:33 - At about 5.2, it turns off the highway to a crosswind, and the slippery gravel begins for the next 3 miles. My breathing was really starting to recover even though I was going a lot faster. Mile 7 was about half headwind. Mile 8 was a nice tailwind but probably had the worst gravel, really slippery. Miles 9 and 10 were crosswind but the gravel ended and the asphalt began; I was starting to find my stride and had recovered from the headwind legs. The second place guy was about 0.25 miles ahead after mile 5, but I had closed to about 0.15 miles by mile 10 (I would see him pass a landmark, then look at garmin to see how long it took me to get there).
11-13.1 - 6:19, 6:27, 6:36, 0:39 (5:45 pace) - Now the part I had been waiting for - I actually did the last 5K in exactly 20 min. I closed to within 30 seconds of 2nd place but couldn't catch him. Mile 13 we lost a majority of the tailwind and I really redlined trying to catch up to 2nd place.
If you break up the race into 2 halves, I did the first 6.55 miles in 46:39 (7:07 pace) and did the second half in 42:52 (6:32 pace). The funny thing is it might have been a positive split effort.
Afterward I ran the race opposite direction until I saw Danielle, and ran her in. She got a 10-second PR, despite the wind. So we are both feeling pretty good.
results (it seems 5-6 seconds was added to everyone's time; I'm sticking with my watch time since I could not have been off by that much!) |