In planning my 2014 race calendar this past winter, I decided to enter another race series, where runners accumulate points in each race based upon your finish, with cumulative race points from the complete series determining overall age group winners. Much like a decathlon. The only previous race series I participated in, was the Minnesota Distance Runners Association (MDRA) event in 2010. The MDRA series consists of 12-13 races ranging from 1 mile to full marathon and literally goes from January to November. It's a good series, but if you run it, you have little wiggle-room to run other races outside of the series. The Minnesota Running Series is only 4 races (a 10 mile and 3 half marathons) that span April to August. I've run two of the four races in this series previously (Goldy's 10 and the Minnetonka Half Marathon). Goldy's is the first race in the series.
Of the 10 mile races I've run, Goldy's is easily the toughest 10 mile course among them. What makes this course tough, are the location of the hills. The longest hill climb is in mile 8, followed by a short but steep hill climb in mile 9. The rest of the course is manageable, but your legs turn to spaghetti after the short steep climb in mile 9. The race begins outside TCF Bank Stadium heading NW on University Avenue. It winds through the East Bank Campus of the U of M, then down along the East bank of the Mississippi River. Then it crosses over the Lake St. Bridge and up the West side on river, before crossing back to the U's East Bank again, where it follows University back to TCF Stadium for finish inside the stadium on the 50 yard line.
It was a cool, wet and breezy 45 degree morning. Overnight rain showers hung on long enough to make it difficult to warm up without getting soaked. I sacrificed some warm-up time, to stay as dry as possible. Radar indicated the showers were going to end any minute, but were lingering long enough to make the start of the race uncomfortably wet and cold. The showers persisted through the national anthem and increased briefly during the first mile of the race. The streets were puddle filled and by the end of the first mile, my shoes were thoroughly soaked. My goal was to maintain a 6:45 pace throughout this race, but I never really got on track. The short warm-up, coupled with cool, wet, windy conditions left me tighter than normal and ran the first four miles 10 seconds higher than my target pace. Three of the first four miles were into the wind which also didn't help. Once I crossed the Lake St. Bridge to the West side of the river, the wind was more to my back, which helped me run three consecutive 6:45 miles, but not good enough to climb back to my target pace. Familiar with the course from two years ago, the upcoming hills in miles 8/9 were starting to fester in the back of my mind no matter how hard I tried to suppress them. I knew the hills were not going to help me make up lost ground, so my mind flipped to more of a damage control mode, to avoid losing more ground to my current pace.
The two hills late in the race were as tough as I remembered them and the last mile back to TCF Bank Stadium was directly into the wind, but I was able to hold it together, finishing the race in 1:08:44 (6:52 pace). My time was 16 seconds slower than in 2012, but running conditions were much better back in 2012. I finished 37th overall among 1,993 finishers and 2nd in my age group of 59. The below results show me 3rd in my age group, as my age group was won by a wheelchair participant. There was only one wheelchair participant in the race, so I guess they elected not to isolate him in a separate category.
An interesting side-note is that Bobby Paxton, who won my age group as a runner, is one of the top runners in the state in my age class. Six years ago he was a member of a 4 x 1600 meter relay team of Minnesotans who set a "grand masters" world record in this relay at the time. Not sure if the record still stands, but here's a link to that article: http://downthebackstretch.blogspot.com/2008/03/grand-masters-set-world-best.html
Among the six 10 mile races I've participated in, this was just my 4th fastest time and was a full 3 minutes off my personal best which I achieved last fall. But considering the tough course and weather conditions, I'll take it. My next race is the second race in the Minnesota Running Series. The Lake Minnetonka Half Marathon on May 4th.
Race Results:
https://results.chronotrack.com/event/results/event/event-7939
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