Notes
Line it up. This was not my best race, but it was solid. 2nd in the slow heat, fastest run by WPI in the 5K (more on that later).
Thoughts the morning afterward:
1) My goodness, was there way too much surging early. I think Scott and I were trying to battle for the lead-out because we didn't plan it out at the beginning. We just needed to drop in and relax and neither of us were going to.
2) Despite the surging like mad, the first part was right on where I wanted to be. 5:10 though the first mile, sub 3:15 through the 1K (I think).
3) The warmup was tricky. I wanted to watch the end of the women's 1K for Maria and then she didn't finish. And then the line in the bathroom was stupidly long (something like 10-14 minutes for moving 4 people through the stalls.) Then I missed Scott and Anthony leaving.
4) We still managed to get back before the end of the women's 200. This was a meet that could have had two buses, honestly. We didn't start the men's 5k until 5:45-ish after getting there at 10:15 or so. That's 7+ hours sitting around.
5) I drank five 20 fl oz bottles of water before the start and really should have drunk more afterward.
6) During the race, I felt pretty good throughout. I need to work on my late race pace, though. Once I hit that one mile to go, I need to start amping up and I don't have that quite yet. My finishing kick is also not great.
7) I did a shorter cooldown because my foot starting hurt with a kilometer to go. It still hurts today, so my guess is that I pulled a tendon or something similar. I took ibuprofen last night and will be icing today.
Overall, I think I should feel a little better about this race than I do. It's my second fastest 5K ever, it was a racing start, I felt strong basically throughout, it's only 5 seconds off my PR. So why don't I? As a whole, the team had a really tough meet. Joe looked great in the mile (the time was a bit slow, but he recognized it 800 meters in and gunned). Hannah and Caitlin had very nice 5Ks. And then it was rough for everyone that I remember watching. There are bright spots in this meet, but it was not what I think/know we can do. It's been a tough season so far.