Reston, Virginia, March 3 2013
Ambitious goal – 1:15:00
Fallback goal – Beat The Cat and/or set a PR
I’ve been hobbled by a knee injury the past couple months and haven’t really been training. Could be tendonitis, could be something else. It’s been improving very gradually, and I was planning to use this race as a benchmark to gauge whether the knee might hold up for the Tobacco Road Marathon in a couple weeks. It mostly felt pretty good during the race, only really bothering me around miles 3 to 4. But immediately after stopping it started screaming at me, and didn’t let up for more than 48 hours. It’s just now getting manageable. I’ve got an appointment with the orthopedist on Thursday.
On the plus side, I felt strong throughout the whole race. I think I kept my mile splits pretty consistent after adjusting for wind and elevation. I normally drag the last couple miles of a race of this distance, but they seemed to fly by this time.
Finish time: 1:18:43, a new PR.
Miles this race – 10
Miles raced in 2013 – 16.2
Here are the approximate mile splits:
1 7:29
2 7:38
3 7:57
4 8:26
5 7:29
6 7:49
7 8:12
8 8:23
9 7:50
10 7:32
I don’t have a wind chart, but based on the elevation changes these splits are pretty consistent.
This was a fine race, just fine. Other than the man-versus-knee drama, there is not a lot to report. I was sure of getting a PR after my one previous 10-mile race on trails and didn’t have any ambitious goals. Leveling the tally would have been satisfying, but I knew better than to push hard early at this distance. I was not sure if Condor was ahead or behind at the start, since we split up to use separate sections of woods after seeing the potty line. But he pulled up from behind before the halfway point, and was good enough to keep me company for a mile or so, before making his move.
I told myself it was enough to keep him in sight, but soon switched my goal to keeping another runner with the same color shirt in sight, and then to catching up to a little girl, and finally to simply beating a boy-girl couple that was running in tandem, all but holding hands. I managed to reel them in before the end, but didn’t even get to see Condor until the finish, since the short out-and-back turnaround described on the map wasn’t part of the actual course.
My pace was also quite consistent.
The last quarter-mile was on the high school track, and I gave what I had left, almost losing my Clif Bar breakfast, finishing with a comfortable PR of 1:20:55.