10K Race Report

Did the 10K race this weekend. It was awesome!!! It was along a lovely flat, paved trail that runs beside the river.

We ran along the paved path heading south. First water station at 3K, very nice as it was warmer than I'd expected. At 4.5K there was a turn around point and you headed back in the same direction you'd come. More water at 6.5K, then we crossed a bridge over the river. The next 2.5K was on a dirt/gravel path along the other side of the river. The footing wasn't bad, though there was some bigger rocks, but nothing major. Another water station just before the 9K mark, then we turned into the field around the community park.

That was neat because you ran a big circle around this park and could see the finish line, hear all the people cheering you on. At this point my son met me at the path and told me to "hurry up, they have cookies at the end!", as he's standing there with 4 cookies in hand (ah to be a growing, active teen). Then about 400M from the finish he came to meet me again and tried to encourage me to begin my sprint, but I knew I wouldn't have enough gas to sprint that far so I held off. The announcer said we had 1 minute and 10 seconds to complete in under an hour. At that point I knew I would achieve my. About 100M out I started my final sprint and was surprised at how much I was able to increase my speed (I've been working on that final sprint). In hindsight I think I could have started earlier than I did, but it's all a learning process. As I came across the finish line I was so focused that I unfortunately ran straight into the guy who'd been right in front of me and also the volunteer who was getting the tag off of his number. Whoops!


I completed the race in 59:22 (pace 9:33 mile, 5:56/Km). This is great beacuse it accomplishes one of my goals for the year (to run 10K under 1 hour). It wasn't until the 5K mark that I noticed the markings on the route showing each Km. I wish I'd seen that earlier in the race because it would have helped me earlier on. I'm quite competitive with myself and I would have been able to gauge better how long each Km was taking me and I think I could have pushed harder. Anyhow, I'm very pleased with how I did and I will definitely do that race again next year (and will improve!).

I was also quite surprised with how well run it was. The water stations were great. But the best part was at the end they had a big, official looking timer. And they had an announcer who called out the number, name, home location and finish time for EVERY runner as they came across. That was pretty cool. And of course we all got a bottle of wine too which was neat.

I was pleased with my time when I finished, but then that little side of me came out and I started thinking I could have done a bit better, could have pushed a bit harder. I don't know if this is a good thing or a bad thing. Also, when I saw the posted results I was a bit disappointed to see I was 12th out of 14 in my age group and 165th out of 232 runners. In the other runs I've done I've been in the upper half of both my age group and overall. Obviously there were alot of faster runners in this group, but it pushes me to get better & faster. I'm thinking after my next run (in 2 weeks) that I should join a running group and maybe learn how to improve instead of just doing my own thing. Or I need to relax and just enjoy the run :)