HRCA Cinco de Mayo 10K Race Report

05.02.09
My official time was 59:08 (although my garmin clocked 58:51 and I stopped it at least 10 seconds after I came through the finish).

This was a pretty good race for me, considering that I have had allergies/sinus/cold-type issues going on all week, and I did not feel 100% today. But, I had trained and was looking forward to it, so there was no way I wasn't going to run...and I really wanted to prove to myself that I could finish in under an hour, since I had a horrible race the last 10k I ran in April. Because I was tired and feeling only about 70% good, it allowed me to really see that the training and speedwork/hills/intervals I have been doing with the running group the past couple of months are paying off. (Overall I've noticed that I've been running a faster on my regular weekly runs, but it doesn't count unless it's legit with a race time validation.) It was a little chilly at about 45 degrees, but this is actually the weather I seem to run best in, so it felt pretty good. And, NO WIND, WAHOO!!!

Mile 1 - 8:45
Mile 2 - 8:32
Felt pretty good and kept a good pace, was cautious not to go out too fast. My legs felt strong and I was powering up the hills, passing people on the uphill and keeping a steady pace. (Big-bastard-hill-by-my-house-training, thank-you-very-much. You have earned yourself the right to stay in my route rotation.)

Mile 3 - 9:26
Mile 4 - 9:38
Starting getting a little tired, my sinus/snot issues were kicking in--even had to break out the kleenex from my pocket. Big hill at the turn-around, but it wasn't too bad (plus then there was the lovely downhill going back...)

Mile 5 - 9:53
Mile 6 - 10:41
More tired here, had a couple of 20-second walking breaks in mile 6 but picked it up again and was staying around a 9:00-9:15 pace when running

Mile .24 - 1:57 (8:13 pace with a 5:50 sprint at the end)
Kicked it back up and ran it out strong, sprinting the last tenth and passing the wonderful gal who had unknowingly been keeping me on pace all race long. :-)

One suggestion for the lovely folks at HRCA: a new graphic designer for your race t-shirts is in order, pronto. I can give you some names. (I am not sure I have seen an uglier batch of graphics than those proudly displayed all over the HRCA race shirts I've collected to-date. I'm almost embarrassed to wear them; if they weren't tech shirts, I wouldn't...)

Overall, I liked this race and the course and I will probably do it again next year since it so conveniently starts like a mile from my house. One interesting side note is that upon looking at the 5k race results, I realized that if I had run it instead of the 10k, I would have placed for my age division. It kind of eats me up to know that....