Race Report: Run for the Parks 10k

Aside from the 5k I ran shortly after Z was born, I really haven't done any racing.  Why?  Well I'm a firm believer that there is no point in paying money to race if you aren't going to RACE.  And seeing as how my training and sleep time was limited in those early months and a couple more lbs than I'd like were tacked on as a result, racing wasn't going to happen.  Was I still running?  Absolutely!  But I was nowhere near in race shape.  However, that changed somewhere along the way, when I found the strength to get up super early, despite the lack of sleep, and get my runs in.  I got into a regular habit of 5 am or earlier runs and before I knew it, my speed started creeping back.  It was only then, that I started entertaining the thought of racing again, because my body was telling me I was absorbing the training pretty well and I felt like I was pretty much close to being back in racing shape.  So I signed up for the Run for the Parks 10k, knowing it would be a perfect course (not to mention an awesome Saucony jacket as swag!).  I wanted to run it last year, but I had plans that weekend.  This year though, it was on!

When I set out my goals for the year, I listed 3 realistic goals:

1) Run a conservative race in a marathon to get a PR and put in a respectable time.  While I didn't run nearly as fast as I would have liked, I had to adjust for the conditions on that day and run my best race, which I pretty much did.
2) Break 19:00 in the 5k.  Being on the cusp of a sub-19 5k with a PR at 19:04, I knew going under 19 wouldn't be that difficult.  So when I took my 1st crack at it, I pretty much blew away that goal with a breakthrough performance in 18:34 and my first ever overall win in a race.
3) Break 40 in the 10k.  This goal goes hand in hand with the sub-19, because if you can go sub 19, it should easily correlate to a sub-40.  When I went 18:34 in the 5k, I should have signed up for a 10k immediately.  However, I didn't get a shot at it before that peak fitness faded when Z was born.  So my sub-40 goal would have to wait.

Pre-Race

As Sunday morning rolled in, the big question of the day was, what will the weather be.  With steady rain throughout the day in the forecast, everyone was worried it would slow down the course.  Temperatures, on the other hand were ideal - mid 50s.  Well, about 20 minutes before the race started, it began to slightly rain.  Nothing heavy, but enough to make the roads slick.  This remained throughout the race, which ended up feeling kinda nice, minus a little loss of traction.  I ended up getting in a total of 3 miles of warm ups.  2 miles about 30 minutes before the start and then another mile with some friends about 10 minutes later, followed by 4 race paced strides.  With about 5 minutes to go, I lined up 3 rows back.  There were some super fast people at this race (winning time was just over 31 min), so I wanted to be toward the front, but not in anyone's way.  And to everyone's surprise, the starting gun went off and within 3 seconds, so was I.

Mile 1

As with all of my races, I developed a pacing plan of starting off slightly slower or at goal pace (6:25/mile) for the start before picking up the effort as the race went on.  I went out a bit fast, but with the flow of runners, and found myself running pretty comfortably.  At about the 1/2 mile point, I glanced down just to make sure I was on target, only to see my Garmin showing me averaging 5:58 pace.  So with that, I pulled back quite a bit and let a bunch of people fly past me.  I knew I'd see them later in the race, because I didn't that there were THAT many people able to run the whole race at those paces.  As my watch beeped for Mile 1, I looked down to see 6:15.  However, the Mile 1 marker was still a fair bit ahead in the distance.  By the time I passed the Mile marker, my watch showed 6:35 and I got a bit deflated, because I KNEW I was running faster than that.  My body and my mind knew it.  I thought it was very strange to be on a pretty straight course and to have the marker and watch be so far off this early.  No way I could have run extra distance from weaving (since I didn't have to based on where I seeded myself) and I ran the tangent of the one curve we had.  So I did what any experienced runner should do - trusted myself and listened to the feedback of my body.  If I was putting in that effort to get a 6:35, then a sub-40 wasn't meant to be.  On the other hand, if the marker was off, everything will work itself out in the end.

Mile 2

As I passed through that first marker, I have to admit that I was tempted to pick up the pace to get back on track.  I knew I'd need to average 6:25/mile to get sub-40, factoring in some extra distance due to weaving/not hitting the tangents exactly.  But shortly after I pushed the gas a bit in response to the 6:35, I let it off, telling myself that in order to run a smart race, I'd need to hold the steady effort until at least the 5k mark.  I found a pretty speedy girl who had just passed me (and someone who I've raced closely with before in a 5k), and decided to stick to her shoulder.  I'm all for chivalry, but we were approaching the end of Haines Point, so I was using her to draft off of, to limit the damage from fighting the wind.  We came through Mile 2 in 6:20 and I noticed that I was about the same distance from this Mile marker as the previous one, so maybe it was just a misplaced first mile marker that  would correct itself over time.  I looked at my overall time at it came out to 12:55 (6:28/mile avg), so I knew I was back in contention for the PR if that was the case.

Mile 3

Sticking to the girl's shoulder, Mile 3 seemed to take forever to get to.  While I normally have issues with Mile 4 in the 10k, I really struggled mentally to stay in it during Mile 3.  I almost let go of contact with the girl, but I told myself to hang on and see what the 5k split would be to determine if I should keep pushing or run my own race.  As we came to the Mile 3 marker, my split was a 6:22, which was a nice relief, since that was into the wind and with some mental struggles.

Mile 4

Shortly after the mile marker, hit the 180 degree turnaround and I checked down at my watch to see my 5k split, which was right around 19:45.  I was right on target if I could could it together.  One little trick I like to use when I encounter a tight turn or a 180 degree turnaround, is to really hammer with a quick pickup to get back on pace.  I did exactly that, which resulted in me taking the lead over the girl I had been drafting off of.  I figured if she wanted to stay with me and use my draft, now would be her chance.  Whether it was the improved race outlook on my mental state or that I was executing to my pacing pretty closely, I started to feel really good.  I didn't want to blow my effort too early, since I still had 2+ miles to go, but I kind of went with it, since I wasn't sure how long it would stay around.  I hit Mile 4 in 6:14, thanks in large part to that surge I put in after the turnaround.  Unfortunately, I no longer heard that girl's footsteps on my shoulder, so I guess she dropped back and I found myself running solo for pretty much the rest of the race, since the people ahead of me were keeping the same distance and nobody came up from behind me to work with.

Mile 5

I knew with my last split that my sub-40 was in the bag if I could just hold pace or even if it slipped some.  My Mile 4 split was 25:xx, so I knew if I could get 2 more miles at 6:30/mile or better, that math would add up, even adding in an extra 1:30 or so for the .2 plus any extra distance.  Just. Keep. Going.  It was at this point, where I also started playing the distraction game.  In this instance, I counted to 30, only each count equated to 3 steps - so, 1, 2, 3 (1), 1, 2, 3 (2), etc.  At the end of 30, I could look at my watch and further down to the course to see far away landmarks coming closer into my view.  This game lasted all the way through till I got the Mike 5 marker, with a 6:19 split.

Mile 6

Just. Keep. Going. was all I could tell myself.  You've worked this hard to get to this point in the race, so don't back down.  Its time to prove something to yourself.  So I started to gradually step up my effort, knowing I'd have a .8 mi long straightaway to the finish, which can seem like an eternity.  So I pushed a bit harder and kept playing my counting game.  And before I knew it, I could see the police lights in the distance, which signaled the finish line.  Once I saw that, I didn't have to play any more mental games.  I just focused on reeling in that finish line and coming through strong.  No finishing kick needed here.  I just wanted to keep picking it up, but focus on staying loose.  I hit Mile 6 in 6:13 and had that last .2 to go.  At this point, I knew I'd have a little extra distance, but I could see the clock was still at 38:xx, so I knew my sub-40 was in the bag.  I kept picking up the pace and without another runner close by, just continued to build.  I ran the last .28 (looks like I ran an extra .08, which is pretty good deviation, since I ran .09 extra at my last 10k) at 5:56 pace, so I closed strong without needing a final sprint.

Summary

Final time: 39:22 (PR of 57s!)
5k splits: 19:45, 19:37 (nearly perfect negative split!)
Pace: 6:21/mile
Overall place: 34/1050
Age Group: 5/92 (top 4 in my age group came in under 35:17!)



So as I mentioned in my last post, when you've done the training and you are a confident athlete, anything is achievable.  I just knew in my head that I was going to have a great race.  While I wasn't quite at my ideal racing weight (still about 3-5 lbs to go), and I could have included some more quality 10k specific tempo runs, I knew I had a great race in me.  For one, racing less frequently allows you to really rise to the occasion, since the atmosphere is unique to the senses.  But on another level, my body was ready for a breakthrough performance.  After all the early mornings and handling pretty solid weekly miles (with quality work I might add), I just KNEW it deep down.  And every time I'd visualize the last mile, I'd see myself coming in with the numbers on the race clock in 39:xx.  EVERY. TIME.  And that my friends, is how you prepare for and execute a race - confidence and mental preparation.

Creating A Confident Athlete

It's about this time in many runner's training that you're gearing up for the Fall racing season. Whether you are training for Marine Corps Marathon, New York City Marathon, or a local 5k down the road from your house, you are bound to reach a point where you start asking the question - "Did I do enough?". And in 99% of the cases, my recommendation for an answer is always YES.  Why?  Because contemplating that answer will not only drive you crazy, but also make you do stoopid things.  What kinds of stoopid things?  Well, I'll get to some of those in a second, but suffice to say, it isn't something written in your plan - you know, the one you follow to achieve your goal.  

 It always amazes me how much time people invest in going through the motions of doing their workouts, hitting their mileage goals, etc. but then something happens and all that goes out the window for chance to "test" yourself.  While testing oneself can be beneficial, and should be part of a regular training program, it shouldn't come as a result of changing your schedule.  While you need to be able to make it to the starting line confident, once you start questioning your training, that confidence goes out the window and you go down a slippery slope of modifying your training to achieve short term goals of seeing instant gratification of your fitness.  So I'm here to tell you to step back from the ledge, take a breath, and listen to what I have to say.  Because hopefully this post will prevent you from ruining your hard earned fitness and potential for achieving race day success, for short term gains.

Let me share with you my top three reasons for why you should stop letting that question dictate your actions:

1) Success is most defined by your ability to execute on race day

As you hopefully know by now, race day success is not so much a factor of your fitness on race day, but really more about how you execute your race plan.  Your fitness will dictate what paces you might run on race day, but you can be the most fit person and have a terrible race if you fail to execute to your ability.  So with that said, no amount of last minute cramming of workouts or changing workouts to "test yourself" will have a significant impact on your race.  You are always better off taking the conservative route and either running your workout as planned, or if something comes up, taking the day off.  Why?  Because both results won't risk injury like a spontaneous workout change might.  Your training plan was designed with your race in mind, so why modify that?  Your fitness on race day is what it is, and as long as you stick to your plan of executing to that fitness, race day will be a success.

2) You can improve your confidence by nailing race paced workouts
One of the most common reasons why people start questioning if they did enough is simply because they reach a point in their training when they lack confidence.  This could be due to chronic fatigue that has set in (those of you in the thick of marathon training know what I am talking about) or it simply could be because you don't have workouts embedded within your training plan that let you "prove" to yourself of your fitness.  These could be something as simple as race paced workouts that progressively get longer as you get closer toward race day.  For a marathon, it might be a gradual build up toward 10+ miles of marathon paced running within one of your long runs.  These workouts serve 2 purposes:

1) They allow your body to get used to what race pace feels like, so it become more economical at that pace
2) Gives you a mental boost by showing you how "easy" it is to maintain that pace. 

While shorter than the actual race will be, those race paced workouts always leave you more confident.  If you are running paces that are in line with your fitness, these workouts are huge confidence builders.  They also let you know very quickly if your goal paces are off.  Specifically, if your goal paces are too fast.  No race paced workout should leave you wiped.  If they do, its time to adjust to slower paces.  And if it goes perfectly and you end the workout feeling great, well you just had a successful workout and built confidence.

3) Simply trust in your training
Hopefully, before you entered your training cycle, you found a training plan that fit your needs.  Whether through an online or a locally coached program, you made a decision many months ago to base your training on a specific system.  And I can tell you from experience, these plans are designed specifically to get you to the starting line.  The workouts are programmed to build your fitness and peak for your goal race.  So why then would you want to throw a wrench into the middle of that plan by adding in workouts that probably will not achieve the same goal of the workout you are replacing?  Common sense advice here is to trust in your training and leave all the testing new things for after the race when you don't have anything large looming on the horizon.  I like to make a list a all these kinds of things so that I can try them at another time.  This list grows (especially during taper) and gives me the motivation to keep me on track as a nice reward for after my key race.  So do me a favor, and just trust your training, because that is what will serve you best on race day, not some random workout that has the potential to cost you your race.

So going back to stoopid things people do - I'm pretty sure I've seen it all.  Here are just a few examples and why they should be avoided:

- Easy runs turned race paced - If your plan said to run easy, it probably means you had a hard workout the day before or you are not at the appropriate time to add race paced miles into your training.  Most plans should contain about 70% of your runs to be done at an easy pace, so get to know this pace, because you do a lot of it.  So many people just start a run and "feel good" and before you know it, boom, race paced miles.  Unfortunately, these will prevent you from the adaptations you were supposed to have as a result of the easy day and may impact your ability to nail your next hard workout.

- Race paced runs turned faster than race paced - Often times during race paced workouts, the pace feels so easy that one ends up running the workout significantly faster than race pace.  Any time you run a race paced workout, you SHOULD be able to run faster.  But that's not the point.  You are trying to teach your body what race pace feels like to become more economical.  Running faster simply changes the purpose of the workout.

- Time trials shorter than 5k - This is primarily for people training for longer distances (ie half/full marathons), but running an all out time trial of shorter than a 5k in the midst of long distance training serves no purpose other than your head.  No training you do prepares you to run a hard shorter time trial, so whatever results simply is what it is, but isn't much of an indication of fitness for a long distance runner.  It also forces you to run much faster than your body typically pushes, increasing the chance of tweaking muscles.  I find that a 5k ensures the pace is restrained enough to minimize risk and also translates more to being indicative of fitness for a distance runner.

- Adding in bonus workouts - If following the plan is good, then doing more than the plan is better, right?  Well, your training plan was designed the way it was for a reason.  And any reasonable plan should have enough flexibility to accommodate your abilities and running schedule.  So when you start adding in bonus workouts, you not only introduce risk of injury, but change the intent of a workout depending on what you add.  While simply adding in a few easy miles might not compromise a schedule, adding hills, tempo, or long runs does.  So if you are considering doing this, be sure to talk to your coach or a trusted resource first.
 
At the end of the day, your mind is an important muscle and you need to build it too.  But they key is doing it in a more risk averse way than many of these types of methods.  A confident athlete is what I ultimately want to see on the starting line of any race.  But I also want to make sure the person gets to that starting line first.  Because without making it to the actual race, you will never achieve the goals you set out to achieve when you started this journey.