Shelia Stride 10K aka 10K Goal Met!

Yesterday morning, I ran another race. This was a regular road race and not a mud run.  Even better, it was here in town.  I was very happy for that since it started at 7AM.

I was doing the 10K, and my goal for the race was to finish in under an hour.  The last two I did were both in 2011, and I had finished just over an hour both times.  As a result, I’d done a couple of 9 mile runs over the last couple of weeks, hoping the longer distances would help my legs and cardio be ready to push it on race day.

Then Wednesday, I came down with a cold.  I blame the 2’s and 3’s from church the previous Sunday.  I wasn’t sure how I’d do, but I figured getting my goal time was pretty much out the window.  I canceled my last short run on Thursday to give my body more rest in hopes it would heal.

It turned out to be a mild cold, and by the time I got up Sunday morning I was feeling pretty good.  Maybe I could PR after all.

I’m still not quite sure what happened Sunday morning.  I got to the race in plenty of time and wandered around a bit.  I hit the bathroom one last time and then walked back to my car to empty my pockets.  I thought I’d have about 5 minutes before the race started, but as I got back to the start line, they shouted go, so I took off.

Not too far past the start line, I was passed by a friend.  I was supposed to be doing this with two friends, but I hadn’t seen them before we started.  One of them caught me and said the other couldn’t make it at the last minute due to a long night with a sick daughter.  Then he took off at his own pace, and I was on my own.

We hadn’t made it more than a quarter mile when my shins started bothering me.  I hadn’t given them much thought, figuring I’d be up in plenty of time for my legs to warm up.  Obviously not.  I stopped for a few seconds to stretch them, but they still were bothering me.  Not enough that I couldn’t run, but enough that they were noticeable.  I decided to keep going and stop and walk if they got to bad, but after mile one, they began to feel okay, so I just kept going.

Most of the course was on the bike path that travels through town.  Since it was the other side of town from where I live, it was very nice running an unfamiliar stretch.  It’s the nice part of the path, too, not the part right next to the road.

I kept a close eye on my watch, trying to keep my pace around 9:30.  If I was under that, I didn’t back off, but if I was over, I’d start speeding up again.  Every time I passed a mile marker, I’d check my time, and I was under10 minute miles, but not by much.

When I hit 3.1 miles, I checked my time again.  I was just over 30 minutes.  That’s when I knew it would be very close.  The suspense was beginning to kill me.

It wasn’t until I hit mile 5 at 48 minutes that I began to have faith I could actually make my goal.  My legs didn’t feel too badly, and I wasn’t nearly as tired as I thought I’d be.  I pushed just a bit more, always aware that I didn’t want to overdo it and miss out at the last minute.

I made the final turn toward the finish line at 59 minutes.  Fortunately, I just had a few feet to go, and I poured on the speed.  According to my watch, I finished in 59:16.  My official time via the race organizers was 59:20.  I’ll take either.  Even better?  I finished 24th overall out of 90 something people doing the 10K.  Actually, I saw lots of people walking the course behind be after I turned around about mile 4, so that doesn’t surprise me.  But it still made me feel good.

So, despite my potential set backs, I made my goal.  Might I have gone faster without them?  Probably.  But for today, I was rejoicing in my time.  Plus, I’m happy that I didn’t feel like I was going to die like I did when I hit my first 5K in under 30 minutes back in March.

My shins are definitely a little sore today.  I’m debating about trying to run on them tomorrow or if I should let them rest all week and wait for ultimate Frisbee this weekend.  I’ll probably decide based on how they are feeling tomorrow.