I ran the Cherry Blossom 10 Miler today, finishing in 1:16:07.
I love this race - it's one of my favorites of the year. I didn't get to race it last year because it was too close to the Boston Marathon. But this year the two were separated by 2 weeks - enough time to race one, recover, and then race the other. Excellent.
The race started at 7:30 am, and I was in the yellow corral - the first to be released. I left my house slightly after 6 am and parked, then did some ankle mobilizing drills and put my racing shoes on, before walking over to the Portajohns (just beating the lines that appeared when I exited my chosen throne room). Since it was in the upper 50s, I checked a bag with a pullover for post race.
I'm noting all of the above in detail for one reason - I ended up not having time to do all of the above AND warm-up sufficiently for the race. So, I either need to be quicker next time or leave my house earlier.
***
The normal efficiency of my pre-race warm-up was marred by shoe issues. More specifically, my shoes were too tight. I haven't changed shoes or socks recently, but I have been working on keeping my feet and ankles relaxed when running. When my feet aren't clenching, I need more slightly more room in my shoes. On top of that (literally), my feet were slightly swollen due to the combination of medication and a high pre-race salt intake (because it was supposed to be humid).
The net result of all of this was that I needed to loosen my shoes slightly. Since I use no-tie elastic shoe laces, this was a chore. I stopped several times during my warm-up to adjust my shoes, but eventually decided we were at "good enough" and warming up was more important than a perfect fit.
I was at least partially wrong. As I worked through my traditional warm-up of 3:00 at tempo-ish effort, 4x0:30 faster, 4x0:10 strides, my left sock kept slipping. Not just a little bit, but completely off of my heel, bunching up under the arch of my left foot.
I don't think I've ever had this happen to me before. So I wasn't sure how to fix it. I stopped twice during my warm-up and pulled up my socks as best I could. And decided that this was one of those things that I would forget about as soon as the gun went off.
***
I entered my corral with about 6 minutes until race start. As a seeded runner, I was in the first, yellow corral. In the weeks before this race, I had debated moving back to the front of the red corral. However, this year the yellow corral was split into three sections, divided by pace. Since I was in the furthest back section, I decided to stay where I was.
I was so far back that it took 2 minutes for me to cross the start line and transition from the anticipatory congestion of the corral to the free-for-all that is the early miles of this race. And I did not have a good start.
To explain the challenges in detail - one of my main issues is rigidity. Basically, my muscles are always slightly contracting tight, and running fast requires me to concentrate on relaxing the right muscles at the right time. (Yes, there are medications that help with this, and I take them. But they're not a perfect fix.)
So, trying to run fast requires a lot of continued thought and focus. Trying to navigate through crowds of people running at all different paces on a relatively narrow road with broken up pavement also requires concentration. And I can only think about so many things at once.
So the first mile was rough. Actually, the first three miles were rough, as we ran across the mall and out and back over the Memorial Bridge. Once we were off the bridge, things became a bit easier, and I was able to speed up. Only to hit a literal wall of people ahead. This section of the course, out and back on Rock Creek Park, was narrow and there was simply no good way to navigate around or through the masses.
So I bided my time - I knew that we would eventually end up on wider Independence Avenue, and I would be able to open up and make up some time.
***
Things did open up on Independence Avenue, and I picked up the pace per my plan. And then....my left sock slipped again under my arch. I debated toughing it out for the rest of the race. But...I still had more than 5 miles to go, and I also had the Boston Marathon coming up in two weeks - I didn't want to tear my foot up or get a compensation injury from an altered gait.
So, I reluctantly stepped off of the course and quickly fixed my sock once again. My left shoe felt slightly loose, so I tightened it before starting to run again. That seemed to do the trick, as my shoes and socks behaved themselves for the rest of the race.
It's always hard for me to get moving again once I stop, and this race was no exception. But finally, with 4 miles to go, we hit Hains Point. There, I finally had room to run and flat decently smooth pavement. And good shoes/socks. I opened up and chased down as many people as I could in the last 4 miles.
I had some issues going up the final hill (actually pretty much the only hill) right before the finish, as I tried too hard to kick and tightened up my muscles in the process - meaning that my body was working against itself. And then I crossed the finish, with a combination of happiness and frustration. I had hoped to run much better. But at least I hopefully got all the hiccups and bloopers out of the way today.
***
Splits were:
Mile 1: 8:24
Mile 2: 8:14
Mile 3: 7:45
Mile 4: 8:22 (long)
Mile 5: 7:01 (short, also includes sock fixing)
Mile 6: 7:30
Mile 7: 7:17
Mile 8: 7:15
Mile 9: 7:08
Mile 10: 7:12
This was a negative split by more than 3 minutes: 39:46/36:21. Which is not ideal for a 10 mile race. But I guess better that way than the reverse.
Other notes:
- The forecast had been for the low 70s, but instead we got the mid-50s for this race - a very pleasant surprise.
- I only warmed up two miles before this race - I think I would have benefited from more.
- My sock-fixing break seems to have cost me about 20 seconds, based on my Garmin report (I didn't pause my watch, but was able to look at the charts later and see how long I wasn't moving). So definitely the right call to stop and fix the sock - 20 seconds wouldn't have been worth the risk of affecting my condition for Boston.
- According to the fancy results calculating thing (aka RunPix) - I passed 242 runners after the 10K mark while being passed by 11. Which again is better than the alternative; I just wish I had been able to pick up the pace sooner.
- I have found that wearing anything tight seems to encourage my muscles to tense, so I went old school and wore split shorts instead of boy shorts. It did feel like the change helped slightly.
- From talking to others post-race, it seems like everyone struggled with congestion in the first miles, including those starting near the front of the first corral. The problem is that the course has been narrowed by the addition of protected bike lanes. The two solutions to this would be a) reduce the field size for the race or b) start the race earlier and reduce the size of the starting corrals. I understand why neither option is great, but I also think something has to change.
No comments:
Post a Comment