On Sunday February 21st Heather and I headed to the Harvard indoor track for the USATFNE Track Championships. I was running the 5k in the hopes of getting in a solid run and making the pace at next weeks 10 miler feel a bit easier. We got there early and got settled in. I did my warm up inside on the track and got in some strides while the woman ran the 5k. My goal was to run hard, but stay comfortable. I figured that this should yield a result of just under 16 minutes. I put on the spikes for the first time since last years USATFNE Championships and I headed for the starting line. The race went off and I settled into the back of the pack with only a few runners behind me. Soon I was right behind Kevin Tilton and just after the first lap Kevin caught the rail and tripped himself up which led to some fancy footwork on my part to stay up right and avoid Kevin. Soon he was off and running toward the lead group. I settled in with a group of three and decided to go along for the ride. I was feeling OK and comfortable as I passed the first mile in 5:03. The next bunch of laps went by pretty quick as I just stayed relaxed and tucked in behind the leader of my group of three. We passed 2 miles in 10:13, so a 5:10 mile. The next mile I started to get a bit uncomfortable and the legs were starting to get heavy, but the goal of sub 16 minutes was within site so I pushed forward with that as the goal. My group fell apart as this mile progressed and I went through 4400m in 14:00, 600m and 2 minutes to get it done. That's 40 seconds a lap or about 5:20 pace. No problem I thought, but 4600m passed in 14:40 and 4800m in 15:20, the 3rd mile passing in 5:07. Time to kick! I covered the last lap in 34 seconds for a finish time of 15:54.
I finished 10th overall, but I accomplished the goal of staying pretty comfortable and running under 16 minutes. I was also able to close out the race very strong which was a good sign. Heather ran her first ever track race running the woman's 5k in 19:01 good for 7th place. Nice race!
Photo by Bob Wiles
Good stuff Chris....although in the results, I don't see you. There is a Chris 'Maloney' from Whirlaway, but no Chris Mahoney. Did you bandit the race?
ReplyDeleteIts my alias. I figured if the race went bad nobody would know it was me ;)
ReplyDeleteYou forgot the best part, where, because you talked your poor girlfriend into embarrassing herself by running on the track you, in return, have to go to Bikram yoga with her, twice. :)
ReplyDelete