Recap (on time!) of first 10k back!!!

After the poor performance I gave in the Race That's Good for Life (again, this was the dumb decision I made to run it despite basically having bronchitis just so my mom and I could possibly win the Mother-Daughter competition), I have been itching to get back into racing.

Today was my chance.

Ryan ran a race two years ago that he described to me as a "flat, fast 10k"...I haven't had a flat, fast 10k in awhile, so I was immediately convinced, providing my workouts went well throughout the past week.

Well, my workouts did go well (yay!) so I told him I was ready to break that looming 38minute mark that should be SO attainable for me!

This race that we did is a little different--the OSF Heritage Run 10k and 2mile race doesn't begin until 1pm. I can't think of the last time I ran such a late race, so I was nervous about stomach issues (I was fine).

I knew the wind would be an issue (20mph from some direction according to weather.com), so Ryan and I talked about sharing the lead with the other runners in the hopeful packs we'd be in.

We arrived and warmed up after BARELY being allowed to race day register as registration cut off time was 12noon and we arrived at 12:05. After our warmup, we saw one of our teammates (Shannon) which was great, but it also meant that I wouldn't be able to win this race as she's a PHENOMENAL runner and would for sure break 37. I was bummed, but told myself to just stick with her and hope that she'd pull me along to a PR.

She did just that. There were two other girls that pushed the pace in the beginning, but I didn't let it get to me as I knew they'd eventually fade (about 1mile in). Shannon's group of her and two other guys seemed to alternate and block the wind for each other...which I was very jealous of as I had broken the two other girls and one other guy that had stuck onto me at the beginning.

Overall, it was probably better that I just ran my own race as it not only pushed me harder, but also gave me confidence that I can run well even with the wind factor. At the turnaround is when Shannon saw me, realized how close I was and took off (she told me after the race). Unfortunately, I had no one blocking the wind for me throughout the beginning 3 miles, so I was exhausted and just told myself to maintain pace.

It worked! I broke 38minutes ALL BY MYSELF. WOOHOO!!!

The only part that I was a tad concerned about (I didn't know physically how my body would handle it) is that I coughed up a bit of blood at mile 5. I'm just going to say that was because I was running a lot into the wind and that I'm no longer sick :)


Splits below...

5;53
6:07
6:13 (18:20...just under 19 for 5k)
5:59 (my only goal was to have my splits equal or be faster than the previous ones -- so mile 1 and mile 4 should be similar, mile 2 and 4, etc.)
6:03
6:04
1:32 last 0.2
37:54.......2nd female, 8th overall finisher.

This workout also showed me that I AM in better shape than I thought after that 13 day hiatus. Now I just have to plan my next race!!!!