Quicker Quaker 5K recap

My ultimate goal was to finally go under 18 minutes in a 5K, and then to see how far under I could get.

My goal pace was 5:40 – which would put me just under 17:40 if I hit that pace.

Cutting directly to the chase, I feel like I ran a perfect race except for one majorly stupid item.  I stopped 10-15 meters before the finish line…DOH!

But I still came in at 17:53 and achieved my main goal.

As far as the stopping, I didn’t come to a complete stop, I just mostly stopped because they had a strip of timer carpets 15-20 meters out and I just thought that was the line.  Had I looked up from behind the blur of my last 200 meter sprint I would have seen the HUGE Finish banner there ahead of me under the 2nd set of timer carpets.  I quickly realized my mistake and cruised into the line.  But it probably cost me a few seconds.  OOPS!  And I’m pretty sure, because I was right behind her and quickly gaining, that I would have passed the 4th place girl Cassie Slade right at the line if I would have kept up the sprint.

Oh well….”Live, be stupid in some really dumb times to be stupid, and learn” though I guess.  That might be one of my mottos in life!  At least I learn though right?  I mean, it may take me a couple tries, but ever since smashing TWO different bikes, in TWO separate incidents,  into the SAME carport on the SAME day 8 years ago, demolishing the front fork of one and the bike rack the other time, I have NEVER pulled into a garage or carport with a bike on top since.  (And I also never have stopped cringing every time I pull under any type of overhead anything in a car ever since)

Anywhoo, back to the subject matter.

PERFECT weather for a race.  Probably around 40 degrees at the start.  Shorts, T-shirt, and gloves were perfectly comfortable after ripping off the warmup suit for the 3.5 mile warmup with strides.

I lined up next to George Zack, Ryan, and Nick Clark, we told each other our goal paces and made bets…and then it was off.

I went out right on pace at 5:40, and it felt like walking pace as the sea of people took off down the road ahead of me.

I felt good about that though, because I had just barely jogged the course, and had already given myself full permission to only run 5:50 avg to the half way point because I knew I could much more likely bomb down the hill in 5:30 pace, than to try to hold 5:40 all the way up and be spent coming down.

But immediately George and Ryan were way ahead of me.  And since their goal was to just break 18, I had a pretty good feeling I would be seeing them again soon enough.  But George was out of sight by 1/2 mile in.

After 3/4 mile I came up behind Scott Jurek, said Hi, then just kept to my pace and cruised ahead.

About 1.25 miles in I closed the gap on Ryan Burch, told him good job, and gave him a nice healthy butt slap, and kept motoring ahead at my pace.  (OK, I didn’t butt slap him)

At the turn around I could see George who was starting to come back to me fairly quickly at this point.

I hit the turn around half way point in a 5:50 average, exactly where I wanted it to be.  And I was feeling pretty good.  Granted, my HR was WAY higher than I have sustained it in any workouts as of late, but that’s how it goes right?  I was hovering between 175-178 throughout the first half.

Just after the turn around I passed George and told him nice job, and he encouraged me on, and then the down hill started.

So I opened it up and started cruising at 5:15 or so, until I noticed I was doing that, and immediately scaled back to about 5:25 pace and kept it just comfortable enough for the next mile stretch.  I knew that all I needed to do was average 5:30 for the last half of the race in order to overall average a 5:40 pace.  So I didn’t need to be running any 5:15′s just yet.

The last half of the race I had just happened to settle in behind 2 girls, not sure who.  They were hitting the pace I wanted so I stayed with them.  They surged a bit a head on the final 1/4 mile up hill.  Then I caught back up on the down hill.

But then Ryan Burch all of a sudden blew past me.

But when Ryan ran past, I looked at my watch and it said 16:55 total time, and I realized I was close enough to start the final kick.  So I turned off the governor and opened up the throttle.

I caught back up to Ryan as we rounded the final bend right behind one girl.

Then I saw the Finish line.  I like that sight.  About 200+ meters off now.

I poured on the gas in ’200 meter repeat’ mode and surged ahead.

And then the finish line screw up.  Wish I would have sprinted all the way to the finish…oh well!

But I out-kicked Ryan by 4-5 seconds…sweet!  To actually beat him in any race is pretty cool for me….because I’m pretty sure it will be a MUCH different story when we meet again in Moab in 6 weeks for a 55K.  5K and 55K are two totally different animals, and Ryan pretty much kills it at the long mountainous races.

George came in about 10-12 seconds after that, realizing he had gone out too hard.  Good running with you George, too bad we didn’t go out at the same pace so we could have tested out that sprint finish!

And the infamous Brit from Fort Collins I believe handily took home the prize for ‘fastest ultra dude posing in a 5K’ with a 16:50 something (don’t remember exactly).  Nice job Nick C!  And just six or seven more weeks and he can retire again from Road Running.

And then there’s my total studette of a wife Nan.  1st place overall for females and 7th overall in I think 16:37!!  She and Tera Moody passed Fiona Docherty before half way through, and then Nan out kicked Tera by about 5 seconds.  Nan is in some really good shape right now…I’m really excited to go to Houston with her in a few weeks to watch her at the Half Marathon championships.  Should be a lot of fun.  And as she stays healthy the next 3 weeks she has the potential to really do a great time there.  She fully trained right through the race today and still ran a super solid pace and beat some stiff competition.  Its almost scary to think what she’ll do when she tapers.

After the race I ran some miles with GZ, Ryan, Nick, Scott, Joe Grant, and Bob Sweeney.  We did about a 7.5 mile ‘cool down’ run up and ran around the waneka lake a few times.  It was nice to meet and chat with Joe and Bob, and get to know the other dudes better also.

Really fun way to spend the morning.  And I’m pleased with the steady progression of my fitness.  Today was about a 30 second PR for me at the 5K.

Totals for the day: 14 Miles – 600′ vert

Race Stats: 17:52 total time – 5:42 avg – 172 Avg HR – 200′ vertical – 24th place overall – And I was right on with my guess of getting chicked 4 times.

Race Results Here

This graph is making the elevation look way more drastic than it was in reality.  It was 110′ net elevation gain on the way out to the half way point.