Notes
Free to Breathe 5k on Kelly Drive. PR, baby! By a lot. Here are some notes:
Course: Liked this course very much. An out and back, which tends to help with my pacing. Also, all three miles were marked, in addition to the turnaround cone. Made pacing very, very easy. Field a little crowded. Took me about 11 seconds to cross the starting line; the time reported here is my actual watch split instead of the clock time, which said 28:43.
Weather: Cold but clear. Staying warm was one of the biggest challenges, especially because the start time was pushed back 15 minutes. I brought sweats with me, then stripped down to tights for the race. This was the right amount of clothes; I actually got a little hot while running. Could have maybe used a fleece jacket while standing around. And perhaps gloves.
The race: This was my best pacing in any race this year (and probably among my best ever, even going back to cross country.) I started out a little slow because of the bottleneck at the start. This is not necessarily a bad thing. Then it opened up and I picked it up, such that my 1 mile time was about 9:14 or so. Yet I didn't feel exhausted at this point, as I had running a similar 1 mile time at the race in NJ. I think my time at the turnaround was about 14:12 or something. After the turnaround, I knew I was on pace for a sub-30 finish. And I didn't back off. I started to pick off people. Fewer people passed me, and I started passing people. At mile 2 I believe my split was 18:29, which would make it pretty damn even with the first one. For the third mile, I just tried to focus on keeping it up and not backing off. I picked off some more people leading up to the third mile. And I started breathing harder and got the beginning of a stitch but basically refused to slow down. My finish time puts the last 1.1 mile at 9:08, meaning it was a negative split. Awesome. I don't remember my third mile split but it was 27-something, meaning I kept that mile in the nine-something range. The last .1 mile was maybe a little slower... I did not have anything left for a sprint.
But I kicked ass. Awesome!!!!