Saturday, September 13, 2008

Shawn's 5K

As previously stated, we participated in our 5K today. Close to 100 people showed up for this event, some serious, but many of them, maybe 25 or so, were from our "beginner's" running class at the Y.

Here are the results.

I warmed up by running a few drills outside in the parking lot to get some blood in the old legs. The start was similar to the Tango, with a big clump of people lining up and someone yells "Go." I chose to take the sidewalk while the majority of the crowd went down the road. This gave me an open shot to barrel down the hill like a runaway truck. Despite this, there were some runaway Ferraris there who were going even faster. My first mile was quite fast, as expected in this race, then we all settled into our paces for the rolling (mostly rolling up) hills to come. Because of my high speed in the beginning, a few smaller people began to pass me as we ascended the first long hill. I was undaunted, and did not walk at all in this race. Strangely (or maybe not), at about the halfway point, three very large men all ended up running together. One was me. All of us were 6'4" or taller. I decided I was going to try to beat them. I think they had the same idea. Well, we battled back and forth, me taking them on the downs, and them passing me back on the ups. I was between them as we crested the last hill. Lucky for me, the last half-mile is down, so I decided I better "drop the hammer" there. It is more like dropping a kids' plastic toy hammer, but I did speed up to some extent. Well, the guy behind me didn't catch up after that, and I caught up to the guy in front of me, but he was determined to drop his plastic toy hammer as well, so he was hot on my heels for the last 400 meters. I gave it all I had, and crossed the line one second ahead of him. Woohoo! Thanks for the motivation, John.

I recorded my best ever 5K time (first one, see) at 27.53. I made it under a 9:00 mile pace! Any of you who have been reading since the beginning must remember how I used to think 12 minute miles were never gonna happen.

It went well. Banner day all around. When's the half marathon?

7 comments:

GC said...

I am very impressed with your time today. Looks like I need to do some more training runs with you to pick up my pace! Nice job!

CSquared said...

Great time! Great Race! Keep it up. Look forward to hearing about future results.

catmarlson said...

Philly Half Marathon is the weekend before Thanksgiving, Nov 23rd.

Can't do a full tango without doing a Half Marathon to start off your day!

Nice run this weekend!

CSquared said...

Wow, SB is really starting to pound you on that Half-marathon. I think his competitive juices are flowing. He doesn't want to give up two much in a full tango to the other teams. I'm glad I didn't volunteer to do it with him, I would be swimming across Presque Isle Bay this fall.

catmarlson said...

"He doesn't want to give up two much in a full tango to the other teams."

For the record Shawn has told me we would be "in the hunt" after seeing the results this year.
I'm just giving the race proper respect in terms of training. I know what I felt like after the 13.1 mile run... biking 20 miles wasn't what I was feeling like. Ha ha!

"I would be swimming across Presque Isle Bay this fall"

Good Point! Why aren't you swimming in the river more?? You have a wetsuit now, you should be out there every weekend.
Why just across Presque Isle?? On a clear day you can see Canada from there!

CSquared said...

I could move to Alaska at least for a couple more months, because they can see Russia. It would be good for Mooseman training. I might need to go with a sleeved version of the current wetsuit.

silent_scream said...

if you do move to Alaska wait watch out for Palin and her cronies, they might mistake you for some big fish.