Monte Sano 15K, October 12^th, 2013

Short;

Time: 1:20:27

Pace: 8:38

AG: 13/43

OA: 120/429

Longer;

I did this race two years ago in 2011, with a time of 1:40:13, for a 10:46 pace. I was just coming off a calf injury, and probably shouldn’t have run it. I ended up walking quite a bit, and was a little disappointed because I wasn’t smarter about it. At any rate, I’ve wanted to better my time ever since then. This is a beautiful course with a lot of rolling hills, lots of shade, through some very nice residential areas, well organized, great weather.  Last year, I was just coming off my colon cancer surgery, so fall racing was out of the question, or at least the longer distances were. So that brings us to this year. I’ve been dealing with PF all summer with reduced mileage; I am just getting my mileage back up over the past month or two, but haven’t done much speed work.  I basically wanted to run this at a tempo effort, maybe between 8:50-9:10mm. I had a couple goal times of 1:27 and 1:22. I wanted to start out kind of slow and ease the pace up if everything was feeling okay. After working a 60 hour week on night shift, and then driving straight to the race, I wasn’t expecting much. I kept trying to pull my pace back, but each time we were going downhill, it just felt too easy and was hitting in the low 8’s and high 7’s. I just kept plodding along and targeting people in front of me to pick off. I can’t recall how many I passed, but it was a bunch.

Splits are as follows;

Mile 1 – 8:54

Mile 2 – 8:38

Mile 3 – 8:26

Mile 4 – 8:40

Mile 5 – 8:33

Mile 6 – 8:41

Mile 7 – 8:34

Mile 8 – 8:47

Mile 9 – 8:21

.3 – 7:39(Garmin shows a best pace of 4:37)!

I need to stop all this racing and focus on my Dec marathon, but I’m having too much fun. I got to meet up and FE with 3 people today, Tracilynn, SuperBunny, and Skygazer. It was a good day. There were 5 state records set in different divisions today. The 1^st place time was 49:35, and second place was 53:52. Damn what a gap!

Thanks for reading

Mitch

Those are some nice splits!  Great job. Congratulations!

Congrats. Great race!

Good work, Hog. Just the fact that you had realistic goals for yourself because of your calf and PF... well, you ran a smart race, I think. Perhaps your goal(s) were too conservative? It's great to see you running again and it will be fun to hear about your marathon. Were you just cruising on the downhill sections without even thinking about it? It's hard to slow down on the downhills. Also, that is cool that you went back to run with Traci. Good stuff, that. Good, good stuff. I hope I can run a race with you someday.

 

I need to stop all this racing and focus on my Dec marathon, but I’m having too much fun. I got to meet up and FE with 3 people today, Tracilynn, SuperBunny, and Skygazer. It was a good day. There were 5 state records set in different divisions today. The 1^st place time was 49:35, and second place was 53:52. Damn what a gap!

 

Thanks for reading

Mitch

Congrats Mitch!

IMO, racing can be a part of marathon training.  It's speedwork, but more fun.  Cool that you got to meet some forum folks.

FE Mitch & Traci

Ric and WIP11, thanks.

Traci, it was good to see you again too. I think you did great, longest run ever? Huntsville Half is calling you, lol. Great pic.

Pad, Bozy, thanks.

Jack, I really struggled during the week to set any goals. I wanted to be realistic, yet I probably was on the conservative side. I done this because I didn't have this race as a primary goal, and therefore didn't specifically train for it. I tried to base the time from my PR half of 8:31, PF all summer, low miles, no speed work. I did that 7k a while back at an 8:43, so I had that in the back of my mind too. The down hills were easy at the faster pace, and yet it was hard to dial it back.

Bin, don't know about killing it, it may kill me, j/k.

Jay, to be honest, that's exactly how I'm looking at these races. I need to do some speed work and hard tempo runs, but it's a little hard to get the LR in on the same weekend. The way my schedule is laid out, it's all going to work out. After Nov 9, no more racing till Dec 14.

Zel, thanks, I still gotta squeeze in the LR's though, and those will be hard to do during the week.

Pink, Right now I'm thinking a 4:10, but have thought about 3:55, and then all the way out to 4:45. I'll know more over the next few weeks.

Smart approach, and a strong finish.  I know what you mean about focusing on the marathon.  I decided that my next marathon training plan will have races worked into it.  I really found myself wanting to race more, but couldn't really figure out how to work them in on the fly. I'm glad you had a good time, and beat your goal.