Notes
Capital Pursuit: a race that's been on my to-do list for a long time; a central Iowa staple, though it's lost its luster in recent years due to smaller purses. But it seems to be rebounding as the winning time has gotten better each year recently (as well as the # of people under 60).
Of course I'm doing a 10 miler in October, and I had planned for that to be my 1st. But with All-American cancelled, I wanted to determine my fitness in order to have an appropriate goal for the Army 10-miler. So this race fits in perfectly (I think, I need to recover from it first I guess).
The starting line wasn't crowded, but I still got out fast to get used to doing that. I was ahead of Gonzo after a minute so I made sure to ease off until Sutton and Terry came up. However, they were still moving fast, but I went with it anyway.
The 2nd mile was oddly slow, maybe because the upcoming 2-mile-long hill. But once we hit the hill, the pace did not slack. Terry and Sutton broke away and I left Nealy as I wasn't really sure how to work this hill. Good news is I never saw the 3rd mile and was thrilled to discover I was a mile further than I thought.
So the 4th mile was my slowest, but effort-wise it was fast. I tried to regain momentum on the 5th mile but it was a struggle. Halfway was nearly 28 minutes, which was disappointing considering I was not confident in a negative split. My 6th mile was slower and maybe reflected this mindset. Setting the stage: Sutton has been about 20sec ahead of me for miles with him catching Hopp, and I keep hearing people cheer Nealy behind me, which was at least enough motivation to keep me going.
Things started to turn around on the 7th mile as we literally turned towards home. Longer downhills became more common and I was happy to discover that I had some speed left in my legs. I also knew that the big/long downhill started in the 8th mile, so I focused on just getting to there.
The pace naturally quickened and I was also slowly catching Sutton. I never did but I also never got caught (Scott Johnson was apparently making a strong move, little did I know). Finished strong as I saw I would be close to 55, which I was pretty surprised with.
So I guess that's a PR. Always interesting to do a new distance. My next 10miler will be flat, so I suppose more even splits will be in order. I'm looking forward to it.
Splits:
5:19
5:34
5:33
5:44
5:35
5:39
5:33
5:27
5:24
5:15