Race Report: Fair Lawn Sunrise Rotary 1st Day 5k

Yesterday was the annual Fair Lawn Sunrise Rotary 1st Day 5k. I've run this race a bunch of times and my current 5k PR (21:57) was set on this course in 2010. I wasn't sure if I had a PR in me today but I wanted to see where I was compared to my last 5k on Thanksgiving. I've been doing a lot of long tempo work in preparation for some winter 10 milers and a spring half and am noticing that my speedy legs have been coming back.


The field seemed larger than in previous years so the start was a bit more crowded than I remembered but once it opened up I was able to put the pedal to the metal and push as hard as I could for 3.1 miles. I didn't have much of a finishing kick which surprised me because on most of my tempo runs I try to push the last 3 - 5 minutes of the run to simulate that finishing kick. I finished in 22:24 which is a 7:13 average pace but more importantly, more than 1 minute better than my Thanksgiving 5k. Clearly, the tempo work is paying off.

Since this was my first race as a masters (40 and older) runner, I was curious to see where I placed in my new age group (40 -45) and amongst all male masters runners in the field. Here are the results:

• I placed 11th in my group. The fastest time was 17:07 and the 10th fastest was 21:56.
• Amongst all male masters runners in the field, I placed 42nd out of 157. The fastest time was 16.37 which was run by a 49 year old. The 10th fastest time was 19:15 which was run by a 51 year old.

I'm very thankful to Fair Lawn Sunrise Rotary and the volunteers for making this race happen. It's a great way to kick off 2013.

Lo and Behold! A picture of me (#453) made it into today's local paper. My race pictures are usually pretty bad, this one is pretty good.