Our early spring has suddenly decided to take a bit of a break this past week with cold, blustery weather. Yesterday was ugly. Cloudy, cold, wet and super windy with gusts over 30mph all day long. Yet, the forecast on race morning gave hope that a small sliver of nice weather would settle over us during the race, before more rain and wind later that same day. I woke up 2 hours before the race ands breathed a sigh of relief when I saw clear skies with no clouds in sight. The winds had also calmed very nicely. It was about 48 degrees at race time with temps projected to climb to the mid 50's toward the end of the race. Absolutely perfect weather considering what we had yesterday.
This was my longest race of the spring so far (10 miles) and a good next progression leading up to my first half marathon in two weeks. There were roughly 1,400 runners in the 10 mile event and despite parking challenges around the stadium, the race began on time at 8am. The first mile took us west from the stadium on University Ave past the U of M campus and down to E River Parkway heading south. I knew the first mile was going to be a breeze with much of it covering the decent to the river. I intentionally held back to make sure I didn't go out any faster than my target pace of 6:45/mile. This wasn't hard to accomplish as much to my surprise, there were several solid hill to climb over the first two miles which I hadn't expected.
Miles 3 and 4 followed E River Parkway down to the Lake Street bridge and then over to the west side of the river before heading north on W River Parkway. Runner traffic had thinned out considerably by this time and I could feel the warmth of the sun on my back as the temps began to climb into the mid 50's.
I held my target pace through mile 7 as I passed under Washington Ave and the U's West Bank. Next came one of the toughest hills on the course heading up toward the 35W bridge. This quarter mile climb at the beginning of mile 8 took more out of my legs than I expected as my pace faded a bit. This wasn't the only hill to conquer in mile 8. This mile included 2 tough hills...a mile tough enough to make any one's legs rubbery. The second hill climbed up to the Northern Pacific foot bridge which brought us across the river to the East Bank again. The final tough hill came early in mile 9, a short but steep climb up Arlington St back into the heart of the East Bank campus.
By this time I conquered all the tough hills on the course, but still had a mile and a half left to go, as I tried to push my burning legs to the finish line. The rest of mile 8 and early stages of mile 9 consisted of many twists and turns through the East Bank campus before rejoining University Ave for the final push to the finish inside TCF Bank Stadium. With less than a half mile to go, we made a clockwise loop around the outside of the stadium before entering on the east end of the football field. One final sprint to the 50 yard line and the race was over.
I finished with a time of 1:08:28 (6:51/mile pace). 81 seconds off my best 10 mile time, however this was the most difficult 10 mile course I have run so far. I finished 34th overall among 1,430 runners and 1st among 43 in my age group. My next race will be the Get in Gear Half Marathon on April 28th.
Race Results:
http://67.23.19.61/system/files/6134/original/Overall.pdf?1334419195
Race Video:
http://www.goraceday.com/watch/6928/
No comments:
Post a Comment