My co-worker JS ran the Cherry Blossom 10 Miler in Washington, D.C. yesterday. I've mentioned JS a few time on this blogged. He's joined me for morning runs before work and recently started at Nike Speed. It was his longest distance race since he picked up the sport about a year ago. If you asked me, he kicked ass!
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I ran my longest race distance yesterday (4/5) at the Cherry Blossom
10-miler in Washington, DC. I consider the race a huge success
because I accomplished what I set out to do: 1) no injuries; 2)
finish the race; 3) complete the course in less than 1:30.
At least I hope I have no injuries. The muscle behind my lower left
leg about 6" above the heel is tender and more sore than the rest of
my body. Send a comment if you have any insight. I took up running
about a year ago so I'm still learning about this great sport and how
far to push myself. As far as the time, I finished at 1:18:55 (according to my Garmin). Official time was 1:19:27.
Washington, DC is one of the most picturesque places to run a race,
especially during the Cherry Blossoms. The conditions were perfect
for running, sunny and no wind with temperatures into the 60s for the
start.
After the start, I found myself running on the edge of the course
along the grass because the course was very crowded. I underestimated
my time when I registered so I was running at a much faster pace than
those around me.
Toward the end of the race at about mile 8 I started thinking about
the finish. When do I start sprinting? I started thinking about those
frigid January runs with Ansky that seriously pushed me. I figured
when I start feeling a little worse than that I should keep that pace
but no faster. At 9.6 I started my sprint only to realize there was a
hill after about 150 yards of sprinting. I had to slow down, regroup,
get back to race pace. With the end in sight I sprinted through the
finish line.
Running is a very fun sport but it's not an easy one. After almost a
year of sit-ups, push-ups, running in freezing weather, running sweltering weather,
rainy weather, etc...I feel good about where I am and where I'm
going-- my ultimate goal--my first marathon in the fall of 2010.
My splits can be found at the link below.
http://connect.garmin.com/splits/2971802
3 comments:
Congratulations on an impressive race run. How would you say having a Garmin has helped you in your training and running? Do you recommend a Garmin for beginners?
Whoa, check out those splits! That's the best way to shatter expectations. Thanks for blogging and sharing. It's definitely inspiring.
The Garmin 405 is pricey but it depends on your goals. If you want to run the same distances each week at a regular pace then the Garmin may be overkill. But if you want to improve your times, compete with yourself and friends, do speed training, intervals, tempo runs, etc...then you definitely need a Garmin.
Prior to the Garmin I didn't have a good sense of whether my training was pushing my limits. With the Garmin (and heart monitor) I know what pace to hit for different training levels.
I definitely recommend a Garmin for beginners because it's important to keep track of times and distances to avoid injury. As a new runner it is easy to push yourself to injury because you don't recognize signals your body sends or you might run too much.
In my case, when I started running I severely underestimated the distances I was running. This led to an IT band injury my doctor said was due to overtraining. I was on the "shelf" for 6 weeks and resumed regular training 3 weeks after that for a total of 9 weeks downtime. This injusry occured after only 3 months of regular running.
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