Sunday, May 18, 2008

Gusher Gallop 5k, more training

Saturday, I ran the Gusher Gallop 5k. This was only my 2nd 5k this year, and the 1st was January 1st. The way my training has gone, I knew I had a chance to P R at this race. But I set a conservative goal of just going under 22 minutes. I should have been more aggressive, but you never know. I set my Garmin for 5k @ 22 minutes. Those of you familiar with the training partner of the Garmins know that this is basically where you are racing your watch. I was ahead of pace the whole time, and I think I held back a little because of that. I went through the first mile in 6:56 and the next two at 6:57, never really hurting but definitely near the edge. I should have pushed just a bit harder, I finished 4 seconds behind one of my age group competitors in the running club. My finish time was 21:37, 2 seconds off my P R at this distance. When I saw the clock, I knew I was close, but by the time you see the clock, it is really too late to make up much time. All in all I'm still pleased at my performance, and encouraged by how good I felt. Several friends did P R at this event, and their exuberance rubbed off on me, so I really enjoyed the race and the camaraderie afterwards.
Today, Sunday, I had planned to run a hard 14 mile tempo. No one had posted at the website about training this morning, so I headed to the S. River trail which is exactly 14 miles. I was planning to run the full 14 at an 8:45 pace. After 3 miles my body said "not today." So I stopped, walk/rested, then changed my workout to a LSD. Long Slow Distance. In the past after seeing that my workout wasn't going to happen, I would have ended it. But I ended up doing the 11 miles that remained at a 9:25 average, and most of this was because I was feeling good on the last 5 miles, and picked up the pace. I am continuing to learn that if you will adjust your pace and remain patient, you can usually work though the hard parts.

3 comments:

DawnB said...

congratulions, nice 5k time, I think I might try the training assistance my next race. way to get that 14 miler done today

Willie said...

Good job on the 5k. Gotta love Garmin, they really are neat.

I'm very impressed that you stuck with a workout that wasn't going well. I struggle with that a lot because I train alone most of the time. I wish I had your strength, I usually give in and stop. Very impressive.

Willie said...

OK I did NOT know that Andy Payne was Saturday! I thought it was Sunday, good thing you said something. It would have been embarrasing to show up Sunday and miss the race.