May 7th, Saturday, 6:30 p.m.
I have to like the outcome of today’s 5K race. I reached my goal which was to break 26 minutes and have a 25 in front of my finishing time. Official time was 25:46.23.
Had a little trouble sleeping last night but was up on time. Had a coffee and some toast and left for the race by 7:30, which was the plan. Arrived in time, things were a little slow at the site, not easy to find the check-in area. I did begin my planned extended warm up on time. I was well bundled for the 50* day. The conditions were actually quite excellent at 50* with no wind and a cloud cover. I completed my warmup with a series of one minute pickups at 8:50. Then I went looking for the starting line which seemed very elusive. I have to say this was not the most well organized event I have ever attended. Well, it turned out that the 5K race was not scheduled for 9 a.m. but for 10a.m. . Yikes! So I had to reevaluate my warmup. I went back to the car with a half a bagel and a juice. Rested inside for 40 minutes to stay warm. Got Back to the racing area at 9:50, still unable to find anybody who knew where the starting line actually was. Eventually people started gathering at some site and by 10 o’clock there may have been 30 people there with no sign of a meet directoror officials. People came strolling toward the start for the next 20 minutes. Somewhere around 10:20 a guy showed up and said that he was going to start the race by saying , “On your mark, get set, go.” Now there was an official timing System and they did a pretty good job, but it was not very impressive, the whole setup.
Despite all these things, I remained confident. My legs feel good, my warm up was good, and when the go word was shouted I begin in a relaxed fashion. Since this was not a very competitive race, I was up near the front right away with the first 15 runners. My concentration was on my pace which was around 7:45 to 7:50 for the first mile, very comfortable. Second Mile was a whole new story. I hadn’t realized how much of the first mile was on a gentle down slope. So in the middle of mile two I turned a corner and saw a substantial hill. In checking my Garmin watch after the race I discovered that this was a 55 meter rise, pretty significant. So my mile time for the second mile was somewhere around 8:35. That left me at about 16:15 for 2 miles, a little bit off my goal. Not to mention I was pretty banged up by the hill. I have not run any Hills on any workout anywhere! In the third mile I can’t say that I actually went into the Black Box. I approached it, I peeked in and then I stayed on the perimeter. I ran a decent 3rd mile around 8:30 and final .1 under one minute. The whole time came out to be 25:46.3, well within my goal!
After the race I learned there was an award ceremony and that I had been the top finisher in the “old guy” category, that is anybody from 60 to 99. Turns out I was the oldest guy in the race but I beat all of the younger 60 year old types. Another interesting development was that one of the prizes for the race was a 3 month membership into the hospital connected Fitness and Rehab Center. This is a state-of-the-art high quality all the bells and whistles fitness center. It has every machine known to man. It has two pools, saltwater. One of these pools is a heated rehab pool, the other is a lap pool. There is a running machine which completely and totally simulates the running motion including the knee Flex. You can do a full stride from back kick through leg extension. The gentleman that signed me up told me that it is the only one in the state of New Jersey. So on days that I don’t want foot strikes that would be a great place to get a full range of motion workout. I will try this stuff out and see how it works. I’m hoping that I don’t get talked into doing a weight program. I have a meeting with a trainer and a nurse on Monday to do orientation and work out a so-called training plan. All this came as a surprise to me so I’m still trying to process it.
So Thursday off put me in a good position, my warm-up plan worked, and I had a really nice morning running a low-key race for PR. Tough to be that. I did come away with soreness in my left foot at the very bottom of the foot. Not sure what brought that on, but I need to take a day or two to let that recover I think. But the good news is no Achilles issues, no calves issues and my right quadricep was totally quiet before, during and after the race. All in all a very nice Saturday morning.