I'm such a freak that I feel like I need to justify cutting my long run day short....for a race! I'm so anal retentive when it comes to trying to stick to my training schedule. It definitely has its advantages at times to be like this, but then again I can cause myself stress for no reason. So before I get into the race I did get out and do some running at home before the race. I was really hoping to get in all 12 miles on the schedule, just broken up into segments. It didn't quite work out that way, but it's all good for a couple of reasons.
Here is my justification just for my own piece of mind. Saturday after I got off work, and after I'd done my short recovery run I talked about in the previous post, we went sledding. I didn't really tell my family what I'm about to write when we were out sledding, but I'm sure my wife wouldn't be surprised. I turned it into a training exercise. I would sled down with my daughter, or alone, and then run back up the hill. If I wasn't running I'd throw my daughter over my shoulder and quickly walk up the hill. Sometimes I'd walk down the hill just so I could help my daughter up the hill and get in another "set". I'm not sure how many times I did it over the 90 or so minutes we were out there (I'm not quite that bad) but I'm sure I did the steep incline over a dozen times. Woo Hoo! Nice hill workout.
Sunday morning I woke up wondering how I'd feel after my hill "sets". I was expecting back pain, hamstring pain, and/or stiff calves. I felt surprisingly good, and after a nice leisurely hour or so to wake up I was out on the road for a 35 min warm up run. I managed to get in 4.25 miles at a 8:14 pace before getting a call from a buddy of mine that competed in the 2 mile Labor of Love race. A banana and an orange later and I was out the door again on my way to NKU campus.
Shortly before race time it was still cold at 20 F with thankfully very little wind. The campus sits on an exposed hill which gets pounded by cold hard winds during the winters. I spent several frigid cursing those winds going from class to class while doing my undergraduate work. We did a 2 mile warm-up run on the course. This was my third time running this race but Rick's first. It's a course that has virtually no flat space with the exception of a couple hundred yards at the the mile turn around point. It's an out and back course that starts on a downhill. This, of course, means it finishes on an uphill. It's not a steep incline, but the race is so short and fast that the last incline seems to grow as your making that last push to the finish line.
My PR for the course was 13:55 set last year. All I wanted to do was beat that time. I told Rick that I was going to shoot for a 7 minute first mile one and then open it up after that. That plan lasted all of about 0 seconds into the race. As soon as the starter went off I let it rip down the first hill and never slowed down. If this would've been a longer race I would have been doomed by the end, but knowing this was only 2 miles I felt confident that I could keep up a quick pace. The multiple warm ups really paid off in more ways than I had expected. I felt loose and my muscles were warm. The best part was that the usual burning of the chest when I exert myself in the cold weather was minimal. The multiple warm ups had me well acclimatized to the cold air.
With everything seeming in my favor I blew through the first mile with a split of 5:47. Wow, I'm tempted to put that in my PR list as my fastest mile within a race. That was the "easy" part as it started down hill with a couple of minor inclines and went around the flat turn around. How would I hold out for the second mile with a couple of small inclines and the final push up to the finish. It wasn't an easy mile, but it wasn't even close to the hardest mile I've ever done. Chalk that up to making hills a regular part of my training regiment. They maybe good for training but hills still suck! The second mile split was a 6:21. I am thrilled with my 12:08 time / 6:04 pace for the race! It was impressive 1:48 improvement on my previous PR.
This race is a perfect beginning to the season. Next up is the Mercy Heart Mini-Marathon. Before that race I might find a 5K to run. I've been itching to break 20 minutes on my 5K time, and after this outing I think I might be there.
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