Notes
Yesterday I ran in the 29th running of the Bennington Road Race in North Bennington. I was really looking forward to this race, not because I was looking for a PR or anything, just because it's been so long since I ran in a short race. The last short-distance race I ran was the CVS Downtown 5K in Providence in September of 2004. The race yesterday had two distances, 3.8-mile and 10K. I chose to run the shorter distance, since my knee isn't at 100% yet and I don't think I could have handled 10K very well. I went and registered at 8:00, because that's when "day-of" registration opened up. I went early to make sure that I got a t-shirt. After I registered, I went back to the apartment to stretch and pick up Nicole. The race took place at the Park McCullough House. Nicole and I drove by there a few weeks ago, but didn't really see it up close. It was a great atmosphere before the race. All the runners were stretching out and socializing on the front lawn. They had music playing, too. There was a kids race before our race. Our race started at 10:00. This was the race route, for the 3.8-mile race. There were 146 runners in the 3.8-mile race, and 86 in the 10K. The roads were about 75% dirt roads, which was nice for my knee. The first mile went by quick. Actually, it went by too quick. I clocked the first mile in 7:50, which was way faster than I wanted to run it. This scared me a little bit, but I just slowed down a little bit and kept going. A little bit after mile 1 was a big hill. I probably passed 15 people going up this hill. I felt pretty confident about that, except that after the hill I felt winded and a bit tired. I realized how out of shape I was, and slowed the pace a bit more. I clocked the second mile in about 8:45, which is a little bit better, but still faster than I had planned. I was doing okay, but I could feel myself getting a bit tired. As the race turned onto Park Street, I noticed that a lot of the people around me were slowing down a lot. Maybe some of these people didn't train too well, but then again, I didn't either. They didn't mark mile 3, but they had a marker for "1 mile to go." There was this guy that had a wrestling shirt on that I kept passing on the hills and getting passed by him after the hills that I overtook in the last half mile or so. There was also a younger girl with a soccer shirt that kept running fast by me and then walking on hills that I overtook for good with about 3/4 of a mile to go. I also saw quite a few people that I recognized from my gym, but I think they mostly finished ahead of me. I started my final kick a bit early, so it was tough to sustain a faster pace near the end. I had a good final sprint once the finish line was in sight. I crossed the finish line in 32:03. The final results according to the Bennington Banner had me at 32:13, 75/146. I was pretty satisfied with the results. I ran way faster than I planned, but it turned out okay. My knee felt fine, although I did wear the knee bandage again. It was a fun race. After the race, I was sitting with Nicole, and Heather came up to say hi. She was there to get some information about how road races operate, because she is interested in organizing one. Nicole and I didn't stick around for long, we went back to the apartment after walking around a little. It felt great to be in a race again.