Also, this winter has been very atypical. The weather has been incredibly nice. At the beginning of it, I dropped roughly $150 for access to an indoor track. In the past 11 weeks, I have used it a dozen times, and some of those were more for comfort and less for necessity. Honestly, though, if I knew paying $150 would result in mild weather, I would have started paying years ago. Or, maybe it was buying a snow blower that did it. Either way, I have been very fortunate for the training conditions this winter.
So, imagine my frustration when the forecast for my race was literally the coldest day of the winter thus far. The mercury read 4 degrees Fahrenheit when I left Ames Saturday morning. It climbed to just 6 degrees by the time the horn blasted the start of the race. And thanks to a 12 mph NW wind, it felt like -11 degrees. This, of course, neglects my 12 mph race pace which added to the wind effect and pushed the wind chill factor into the -20 to -30 range.
The downtown (Riverfront) YMCA in Des Moines puts on the Red Flannel Run, which helps support programs for several inner city kids of Des Moines. The race starts and finishes at the Y. Approximately 2,300 people registered for the race. The results show that roughly 1,700 finished it. Despite that enormous crowd, the YMCA did an amazing job.
The facility was open at least an hour prior to the race for packet pickup, but it remained open for stretching and even full access to the locker rooms was available for runners. Afterwards, they served a pretty healthy spread of breakfast items and there were osteopathic adjustments available from the university program.
I took advantage of all offerings. It was nice using the locker room and not a porta-porty. I would have showered too, but had another run to complete when I returned to Ames. My breakfast was good, but I wished I hadn’t bit into the breakfast burrito. I’m sure it was fine, but I did not agree with its presence in my mouth. At my adjustment, my student checked out my back, hips, and legs. After some stretching, I was diagnosed with a possible hip-slip likely from the numerous laps at the indoor track. After an adjustment targeting the high alignment, and a check from the program director, I was “all better.”
As for the race itself, I am very satisfied. Beforehand, I spoke to several of the Iowa State guys that I ran Living History Farms with and had a good feel of who was there and which distance they were racing (3-mile vs 5-mile). I planned to run the first mile in about 5:10, with the first half-mile no faster than 2:30. This was consistent with the other runners. One of the group took off much faster than that and possibly ran a 2:20 first half-mile. I stayed back through the first 2-3 blocks sitting in roughly 8th place, then starting working my way up.
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| Race start. I'm with orange hat. |
Ultimately, I knew I had to catch the front-runner (not in photo above) since we were both running the 3-mile . At LHF, he had beat me by 16 seconds. We pulled even at the mile mark (in 5:07) just before turning up a long hill. At that point, we become a pack of five runners. I knew two of the other three were going for the 5-mile. So, when two passed me running side-by-side, I let them go. I felt I had my race won because my top competitor had abandoned his race plan and was paying a small price for it. It happens to all of us. He's 2-for-2 at LHF, so there's a good chance he'll get me next time.
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| At about 1-mile, just starting a 3/4-mile long hill. I'm #323. |
We finally ended the hill at 1.75 miles and turned for home. I chose not to push too hard during the second mile, which I covered in 5:22 as I planned to hold some back for a strong finish in the event that I needed it. On the return trip, now running downhill, I opened it up a little more. Unfortunately, I had to dodge a stopped police car that had gotten clogged on the road by the approaching thrall of runners. I barely squeaked by, but broke my rhythm and stride.
At a half mile to go, I really started to push it in. I still held a decent gap, but wanted to put the thought of catching me out of his head. My breathing became a high-pitched wheeze as my throat tightened and my Oxygen needs increased, but I had been there before and was undeterred. Just ahead of me was the split point where the 5-milers went straight and I got to turn for the final two blocks where I would finally get the pesky cross-wind at my back. Much to my amazement, the one runner of the top six I didn’t know turned and headed for home.
The gap was too large, but I pushed hard anyway. My last quarter mile was 71.5 seconds (4:46 pace) and my last mile was 4:56. I finished in 15:25. The winner ran 15:12 and third place ran 15:36. In the previous 11 years of the race, only once had someone ran under 17:00 minutes! I can’t imagine how much faster we would have gone under better weather conditions or if I had done different training. I ended up running 82 miles this week. Also, I should note that the winner ran the fifth fastest time (15:28 5k) of any class at this year's state XC meet (which I never even qualified for in high school). My high school best was a very modest 17:59.
I was very happy with the result. I know right now I am training for a marathon and not for short road races. Also, this race was not a part of my training program, but just something I threw in to celebrate the end of 11 weeks of winter training with my running partner (who ended up not racing). As far as I’m concerned, the base is there for some very fast 5k times this summer, but the speed work will have to wait until after the Boston Marathon.
For $25, I got a great long-sleeve tech shirt, a good breakfast, a realignment, great socializing, and a fantastic run. I may be hooked on this race. The only downside is my award will be mailed instead of received on race day.
Here is my training for the past week.
I started Sunday at 4:45 AM after a terrible night of sleep. I woke up at least every hour and possibly more frequently than that. After a quick bowl of oatmeal and a banana, I headed on a 200+ mile drive for an indoor track meet. It went very well. I ran in the 3000m and 800m. The 3k went almost 100% according to the script and served as a solid warm-up for the 800m. Then, considering I had ran 82 miles in the seven days before the 800m and did absolutely no speed work at all, I was pretty thrilled about being only 2 seconds short of my lifetime best. After throwing in the warm-up and cool down, these 6 miles served as the first half of my two-a-day.
I ran the second half after getting back to Ames around 4:30 pm. It was a quick 4-miler at the lake and it felt really good considering I nearly fell asleep on the drive home. By the end of the night, only my hamstrings were a little upset with me, but I completely expected them to be bothered. Those power muscles have mostly been neglected for the past three months. Total: 10 miles – 1:06:00 (6:36 pace).
The next day I set out for my longest run of the week. First, we did 10 miles at 7:20 pace. Then, I refueled and set out for 12 more miles. They were tough. I wanted to cash it in around mile 13/14, but all of a sudden at mile 15 I felt alive again. I believe my refuel kicked in. I added some more calories at mile 16 and was able to cruise on the last 6 miles. A couple hundred calories made all the difference today. Total: 22 miles – 2:35:00 (7:02 pace).
I followed up the 22 miles by running 15 miles the next afternoon. The first 7 miles took 52:11 min and the last 8 solo miles took 51:11. They all felt really good. I also threw in a good mix of hills into the run. Total: 15 miles – 1:43:22 (6:53 pace).
Wednesday, I paced some 800s at the high school and ran 9 miles total. I classified this workout as my aerobic run for the training program, but 800 repeats are hardly what I was supposed to do. The 7x800s I ran were 2:41-2:44-2:38-2:41-2:41-2:41-2:45, so roughly a 2:42 average. I routinely run my set of 800s around 2:28-2:32, so this felt smooth and I did not take true recovery in between but rather jogged another half-mile in about 3:40. Total: 9 miles – 1:00:05 (6:40 pace).
Thursday, I was able to do a nice recovery run of 6 miles. It was much colder than the runs we have had most of winter and it only looks to get worse the next 3 days. In the end, the run felt nice, but really short. Total: 6 miles – 45:56 (7:39 pace).
I ended the workweek with a second recovery run of 6 miles with some high-intensity strides thrown in at the end. In fact, they felt even quicker than the 800m race I ran on Sunday. We had to do this workout indoors at ISU, which was really crowded due to a track meet. One would think that D-I track athletes would understand the rules of running on a track, but apparently not. There was much congestion as teams ran in groups of 8 runners, 4-wide. This is only a 3-lane track. Some runners went the opposite direction, others watched from the rail, and some did a full circuit of stretches. Even if they weren’t track athletes and didn’t already know track etiquette, there were signs posted explaining the rules. Anyhow, it was nice to get in another recovery run. Total: 6 miles – 46:48 (7:48 pace).
Saturday was race day. I generally try to run my warm-ups fairly quick to wake my body up, get my heart-rate up, and break a small sweat. So, I ran a 2.5-mile warm-up in 15:28 (6:11 pace). Then, I hammered out my race in 15:25 (5:08 pace), and I ended with a short 0.5-mile cool down to my car. After getting back to Ames, I ran 8 more miles indoors at ISU in 58:24 (7:18 pace). Total: 14 miles – 1:32:47 (6:37 pace).
For the week (Sun-Sat), I hit 82 miles in 9:29:58 or 6:57/mile.
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