Gameday 5K

Due to a down week between races in the Winter Series, and because my social life is non-existent, I opted to race the Gameday 5K this past Sunday in downtown Colorado Springs on a whim. There’s absolutely no reason why I should’ve expected a decent race, as my training is limited to short 30-minute runs in the morning before school, with nothing that can be remotely close to being considered “fast.” But, I’d raced a surprisingly-respectable 8-miler at last weekend’s Winter Series #2, and I was curious as to what that could translate to on terrain that wasn’t undulating and icy mountain trail.

Waking Sunday morn, I made the slow jog over to the race as my warmup, about 2.5 miles from my house. Flabbergasted upon arriving at the race scene, I would soon discover there would be close to 600 racers in the 5K alone (another 500ish in the half-marathon that would also be racing).

A couple minutes of terrified hyperventilating later (to this day, cannot race without an initial anxiety attack), I ran some quick strides, then hopped on the starting line. It was sunny, but still pretty chilly – probably no warmer than 30 degrees, we were lucky that there was hardly any wind. Trying to not be a total idiot, I decided to race clothed this time around, sticking to some shorts, tee-shirt, and gloves (also, some sick shades to hide my deer-in-the-headlights look). I also opted to race in my Hoka One One Cliftons, as I’d been feeling pretty great in them recently, and finally had to chance to use the road shoe on … well, some roads.

Because this was my first road race since my collegiate days, I had absolutely no idea what to expect. I had no idea how I’d react to some back-to-back sub-6 miles, as: 1. I hadn’t run that fast since June, and 2. I’d NEVER run that fast at 6K ft. of elevation. But I came in with a goal of going sub-18, which would equal roughly 5:50 pace per mile, and based on last week’s performance, something I figured I’d be able to manage. Maybe. Hopefully. We’d see.

The whistle blew, and we were off, me quickly finding myself in ~6^th place. Two runners nearly sprinted to the lead, and I was happy to let them go, telling myself to relax this first mile, then negative split as long as I felt good. We started down a relatively steep downhill, and within a quarter mile were we onto a packed dirt trail, three of us running in a pack, chasing three runners ahead. I chilled the first mile, taking the lead of our chase pack but making sure to relax until we hit the first mile: 5:40ish. A tad faster than I had wanted, I took stock and felt pretty good, so decided to leave my pack and start bridging the gap to the 3^rd place runner. The two leaders were already at least 40 seconds ahead, but 3^rd place was within 20 seconds, and I could tell I was slowly gaining.

(Getting my kicks off beating high schoolers)

The race was an out-and-back, and as I neared the turnaround cone, I saw first and second come blazing by me, probably with ~a minute lead on me. But, I was able to catch 3^rd place right at the turnaround, relatively close to the two-mile marker, and decided to throw down. Used to longer races, the fact that I only had 1 more mile was a relief, and making sure I had nothing left, I opened my stride and really started pushing. Plus, the fact that I was currently in 3^rd place (podium!) was pretty motivating, as well as passing the rest of the runners still making their way out (hearing a couple Go Mr. Welch! means at least a few of my students saw my atrocious form).

(Sucking wind, hard)

I checked my GPS watch a couple times that last mile, and surprised myself when I regularly found myself running 5:30ish pace. It was around 2.6 miles when things started hurting, and I probably checked the distance left on my watch every 0.1 miles until the finish. Soon though, it was in sight, and I threw in one last kick, finishing down the last straightaway with the clock in sight, ticking up to 17:45, 46, 47…

Even the race officials are amazed I managed to finish with THAT kind of form...

My official time was 17:48, a 5:46/mile average, and good enough for 3^rd place overall. To be quite honest, I was ecstatic with my time, despite finishing ~a minute behind 2^nd and 1:20 behind 1^st (uff da). But this race marked my first “fast” (in quotes for a reason) effort here in Colorado, and the fact that I was awarded 3^rd place up at the award ceremony was a pretty cool experience. Obviously, there’s still a lot of work to do, but my first month of real (regular) training is starting to pay off. The Winter Series #3 race isn’t until February 14^th, which means I’ve got a little less than two weeks to put in some solid training before a trail 10-miler with some stiff competition!