Great Race Challenge (5K & 10K) 2021 Recap

These past two years have been incredibly challenging. Spring 2019, I was in the best shape of my life. In Summer 2019, I had some personal and professional traumas (if you know me, YOU KNOW) that meant that, while I kept running, I had to stop lifting for a long time. I was able to get back to a gym around mid October 2019 but then everyone knows what happened in February of 2020. I’ve managed to keep running, but I have definitely lost a lot of strength (and confidence). My virtual races have been slow and felt like a struggle. I’ve done… fine at the few in-person races I’ve done, but not amazing. So, when I signed up for the Great Race Challenge (5K at 8am and 10K at 9am), I was somehow both optimistic and had low expectations. I wanted the best! I thought it was possible! But I was really worried about letting myself down. I had a goal for the 5K: sub 24:03 so I could get the lower seed in the Manchester Road Race. It was about 20 seconds faster than my previous fastest 5K, so it was definitely a stretch.

I did it. Carrying ten bonus COVID and stress-induced pounds, I cut my 5K pace by 40 seconds. The race itself was almost a blur because I was just trying to go as fast as possible. I did 6min/30s run/walk intervals, which worked out ridiculously well. The one “hill” on this race is my least favorite part of the 10K and always my slowest mile… and it didn't disappoint on the 5K! It was my slowest mile by 1:20. When I finished, I wasn’t sure of my exact time, but I knew when I crossed that I was sub-24 and I grabbed my medal and then started crying. Unfortunately only for a couple of minutes because I had to get my ass to the bus to head back to the 10K start line.

Apparently, sitting on a bus for 15 minutes after going all out on a 5K is not great! I didn’t have high hopes at all for the 10K and got started pretty slow. I spent the time in the corral just trying to get my muscles to loosen up a bit. It worked well enough because, by some miracle, I also PR’d my 10K! Only by about 4 seconds, but still a surprise to me since my last fastest was the same race in 2019. It’s definitely given me some hope that all the slow miles I’ve put in over the past two years haven’t been for nothing! Also I have to shout out Monday Night Track with City of Bridges Run Club and my coach, Cat Bradley.

Distance	Time	Pace	Age Group Place (%)	Women Place (%)	Overall Place (%)
5K	23:44	7:37/mi	6/274 (2.2%)	39/811 (4.8%)	156/1445 (10.8%)
10K	53:09	8:33/mi	67/274 (24.4%)	345/1684 (20.5%)	1113/3410 (32.6%)

Pittsburgh (Half) Marathon Weekend Recap

Well, that was surprising. Let's start with the 5K.

5K

I... did not do well in the 5K. Or at least I didn't quite get the time I expected. Which, granted, might have been a bit ambitious. But I'd been feeling pretty good and felt like I should be able to do three 8 minute miles in a row. I was wrong. My splits were more like:

Mile 1: 7:57
Mile 2: 8:23
Mile 3: 8:54

Totally the opposite of negative splits. Luckily for me, no one else was trying on the 5K, so I actually did pretty well comparatively!

Overall: 443/3789 (top 12%)
Women: 122/2219 (top 5%)
Division: 19/347 (top 5%)

Beggars can't be choosers, so I'll take it.

Half Marathon

I did not think I would do well in the half. My training has been mediocre ever since I switched from the full to the half. I haven't done well in recent, shorter races (looking at you Pirates 10K and the 5K I did the day before!). So I lined up a little bit closer to the back, put some music on, and just did my best. And about midway through, I realized that my best this race might actually be my best ever. The one thing about Pittsburgh is that it has SO MANY HILLS. Every time I crested a hill, I thought "surely that will be the worst one". And yet, every time, I was wrong. According to my Garmin, the worst hill was actually at mile 12, which is also where I had the slowest pace. I still had energy, but my quads were feeling dead from hills. I've got a table of my pace/mile, but I also included what Strava calls "Grade-Adjusted Pace", which I think just exists to make me feel better about myself? Ok, maybe it actually helps determine if I put in even effort over even pace. Which, I think I did? According to the GAP, my pace only varied by a minute over the whole 13.1 miles.

Mile	Pace	GAP	HR
1	9:20 /mi	9:18 /mi	146 bpm
2	9:04 /mi	9:04 /mi	147 bpm
3	8:54 /mi	8:53 /mi	158 bpm
4	9:07 /mi	8:59 /mi	167 bpm
5	8:57 /mi	8:56 /mi	173 bpm
6	8:41 /mi	8:39 /mi	172 bpm
7	9:34 /mi	9:20 /mi	173 bpm
8	9:05 /mi	8:57 /mi	169 bpm
9	9:17 /mi	9:13 /mi	168 bpm
10	9:30 /mi	9:24 /mi	173 bpm
11	9:18 /mi	9:16 /mi	173 bpm
12	9:55 /mi	9:14 /mi	172 bpm
13	8:16 /mi	8:30 /mi	174 bpm
14	7:13 /mi	7:31 /mi	176 bpm

I ended up coming in at 2:00:44, which is just SEVEN SECONDS slower than my personal record. Considering my PR was set at Run to Remember which had a total elevation of 138ft (this one was 454ft), I'm counting this as a personal record. I beat my previous time by over four minutes! I think I also did better comparatively than I ever have before in a half:

Overall: 3433/12795 (top 27%)
Women: 1342/7495 (top 18%)
Division: 238/1265 (top 19%)

Apparently I both run AND do double-unders with the same slack jaw and blank stare 😛

The Great Race Recap - Possibly My Hottest 10K?

When I signed up for the Great Race, I did not imagine that it would be this hot in late September. Well... today has a high of 89 and yesterday, it was between 75 and 77 degrees Fahrenheit. The course was only about half shaded, so I ended up getting beat up by the heat pretty quickly. Admittedly, I started out a little bit too fast. But when I realized that I was on track for a 5K PR, I just decided to keep pushing it. It paid off and I finished the 5K in 25:13. If I had been running the 5K, it would've put me in the top 11% overall. I had to slow down a bit after that, but really not by too much! What really got me was mile 5. There was no shade, it had a bit of an uphill, and I was just spent. If it had been a bit cooler, I think I could've kept up my pace and finished two minutes faster overall. Next year! End result of the 10K was a finish time of 53:48 (pace of 8:39/mile). I finished top 18% in my division, top 14% of women, and top 25% overall. I was a bit bummed that I didn't hit my goal of 50 minutes, but I think I can do it next year!

This Week In Workouts

Despite not running and overall feeling pretty off my game, this has been a good week for Crossfit PRs. On Tuesday, I did a 65# power snatch, which was a 5# PR for me. On Wendesday, I did a 15 minute AMRAP of 5 53# suitcase deadlifts (one 53# KB in each hand), 13 burpees, and 9 goblet squats with a tiny KB. I managed to get *almost* 8 rounds... two reps short! I felt pretty good during that and was able to keep at a really consistent pace that felt really good. Today was my biggest PR day and favorite weightlifting day... DEADLIFT DAY! My previous one rep max (1RM) was 215# and today I did 1x3 at 215# and then a 1RM at 225#! I've been stuck at 215 for quite a long time... I first hit it about 5 years ago? So it's really gratifying to see my work pay off and finally see a nice big increase in weight.

14 Miles: Done

This was my last long training run. I spent 20 minutes taping up my feet and my knees and I think it paid off. At no point was I limping (though I was pretty slow for a few miles). I set a new PR for distance and pace for distances over 10 miles. I finished 13.1 in 2:22:17 and finished the whole 14.15 in 2:34:37 at a pace of 10:56 min/mile. Considering how sore I was when I started, I'm feeling pretty confident that I can hit my goal of 2:10 come race day... maybe even sub 2! Considering I did my full marathon in 5:55 6.5 years ago, I'm feeling pretty damn amazing about these times.