A Frosty 5K

Today was the Frosty Festival 5K. I decided to register for it for the same reason as last year, to kick myself a kick in the butt to get back at running regularly.

Once registration was sold out, I took at look at who was registered. Last year I won a medal in my age group so I had to see if there was a chance this year of course. I look at the list and the first name on the list: Marc Alivio.

Damn

Well there goes one medal in my age group. As I go through more of the list I see 2nd, 3rd, and 4th in my  age group. None of them are me. Ok no medal, no big deal. Now with that out of the way it was time to decide on a goal.

Based on the fact that I haven't ran much lately, my pace from Thursday, and knowing the course, I knew that breaking 30 minutes wasn't in the cards for this race. Last year I ran it in 33:54 so I wanted to beat that.

Got to the start line and boom we're off. Tanya was flying and I decided to go her. I felt like we were going too fast but I knew the course and after the first two kilometers, it's all with ill, sup ho I decided I should get fast ks in while I could, it's the only way I was going to beat last years time, and no matter how much energy I saved, I don't think Commonwealth would be any easier. So I said screw it.

1st K: 5:39
2nd K: 5:28

The biggest pain of this run was that the people with the mile markers weren't even close. So I wasn't sure what was going on. I couldn't remember the actual distance from the year before, so I wasn't sure if the race was 5 or 5ish or not even close. The first k mark was at .8, 2nd at 1.75, 3rd at 2.75 and then the 4th km wasn't even at 3.5.

Anyways went up Commonwealth and it was brutal. Tanya pulled ahead for a while and I caught up for a bit.  I think she let me catch her, but that's ok. She then told me to make sure I was taking deep breaths. I guess she could hear me struggling going up the hill. Like any smart man, I did what I was told and it certainly helped me, Tanya pulled away again, she was always in sight but I just didn't have it in me today to catch her. The rest of the race went like this.

3rd k: 6:30
4th k: 7:15
5th k: 6:52

Usually I turn it on at the end of a race but with all the hills, I couldn't get any momentum. I finished 31:43. A much faster time than two years ago. Given that the conditions were poor last year I feel like I'm at least close to the same place as I was last year, maybe a little faster.  And for those who were wondering, I didn't see Brenda or Derek the entire race, they both smoked me. But that's ok I'll get them soon.