Three minutes

For reasons I will never understand, this past weekend was a big local racing weekend.  In mid-July.  Why?  As I was heading to my Sunday race, I heard it was going to be our first day at or over 100.  I can't really complain, usually we hit 100 earlier than this. 


Anyway, my plan for the weekend was to do a slow and easy 5k on Saturday, and then push for a triple negative split at a 15k on Sunday. 


Planning was not my strength. 


Saturday morning I ran a very short warm-up and then hung out with friends.  Definitely not planning to race.  I ran my first mile at a fairly comfortable pace, pushing just a bit just so I could get out of some of the crowd.  But then I picked it up a bit through the U-turn.  And passed a friend shortly thereafter.  I thought maybe I'd run hard for to have a solid second mile time.  And then somehow I kept going.  My third mile was my fastest, more than 30 seconds off my first mile. 

It didn't feel great, but it also wasn't death.


I checked my time and realized I was almost exactly 3 minutes off my 5k PR.  That's just one minute per mile.  And that was with a not-death-effort first mile.  Wow.  Does this mean it's feasible to 5k PR still?  I mean, I feel like given that first mile, I easily could have shaved 30 seconds.  And take away temps in the 80s and sun, and there's another 30-60 seconds.  And lose ten pounds, there's another 30 seconds.  And work my @ss off, there's another minute? 


That's insanely exciting!! 


Unfortunately, running faster than planned on Saturday did not bode well for my results on Sunday. 


I managed an easy first 5k, and I picked it up for the second 5k.  But unfortunately, mile 6 was the mile of the day.  After that, the wheels came off, though just mildly in reality -- it felt like they were coming way off.  It took so much effort not to just walk.  One of my friends was supposed to double back and run me in, and when I hit mile 9, I was so pissed off that he hadn't come back yet that I almost decided to walk until I ran into him.  Thankfully I didn't because he was just standing around at the finish line, waiting.  He said he was catching his breath and about to head out to get me, but I have my doubts.  Either way, I managed to fight off the walking and that meant I managed a negative split, which I am happy about, but unfortunately, it wasn't the triple negative split that I wanted, trying to have each of the 5ks be faster than the last. 


Technically, I think my splits went like this:


1st 5k:  moderate pace
2d 5k:  one minute and 10 seconds faster than 1st 5k
3d 5k:  30 seconds faster than 1st 5k


So not horrible, but not what I wanted.  Definitely could have been worse!


The rest of the weekend consisted of shopping for more new wheels for the husband.  In addition to the new car we finally got a couple weeks ago, he also got a bike.  Four wheels just wasn't enough...


Sunday was his first ride and it was a mess -- he overestimated his ability, and underestimated the temperature, the distance, and the amount of water he'd need.  He rode to the finish line of my 15k race and found a bunch of my friends, but never found me.  I stayed for a beer after the race and still beat him home.  Yow.  But he's still excited about it.