Notes
8 MPH winds
19:35 officially
This was my first 5k in four and a half months going all the way back to week one of training for that stupid marathon.
I had a couple of other races penciled-in since the big 26.2 but race day conditions were not optimal so I passed. That was not the case today as aside from brisk winds the conditions could not have been better for where we are on the calendar.
I have ramped up the speed work ever so carefully the past month and felt pretty good about where I was going into today's race. That said I have been having trouble at the track running my paces by feel (often running them too fast) and that trend continued this morning as I checked in at the half mile mark of mile 1 at a 5:37 pace, some 20 seconds faster than race pace. I spent the rest of mile 1 trying to find the right effort but just could not dial it in and just kind of fell into a 6:03 for the first mile.
I began to bog down around the 1.5 mile and it was then that I realized my mile 1 shenanigans had done me in. The rest of the second mile I just focused on not letting my pace bottom-out as can happen if you are not careful.
The last mile was spent running directly into a headwind and I am actually pretty pleased I was able to match my mile 2 split (6:25) for mile 3.
I did not bother to kick at the end knowing I was well off any type of significant personal best so I just kind of held serve the last tenth of a mile, which is strange I know but typical for me when I have stunk it up (in my mind).
Oddly, today's performance was a much better one than that last 5k on July 27 (6:08, 6:40, 6:26) so there is that.
My legs felt really good and the pace came as easy early on as I can remember. This indicates that a breakthrough is there to be had I just need to focus on relearning 5k effort.
Overall it was not quite the time I was looking for but it is good to be back in the 5k game and I look forward to getting back to the track and continuing to work on running fast by effort.