Running in the Middle

I decided to cut back on my miles and try and take it easy for a few days.  So many little aches and pains nagging at me I don't want to push too hard and get injured.  Maybe I got a little too excited about my 1/2 coming at the end of the month and upped my miles too quickly.  I have a habit of pushing myself too hard, I need to learn how to pull back a little.

Felt great to get out and run in the crisp fall air.  I wanted to go further but it was getting dark and I hate running in the dark.  Have a race coming up on Saturday at Thanksgiving point, women only run.   Its 6k which is kind of a weird distance.  Hope I can have fun and that it does not rain like it did last year.

Tried to get a bit of a long run in since I missed this weekend.  A calf muscle has been acting up the past few runs.  But my chiropractor showed me a new way to stretch it, he said it was the soleus.  That really seemed to help because I barely felt it my whole run.  I'm lucky enough to go to the chiropractor three times a week for the past month.  Got rear ended in Aug. and I'm being treated for neck and back strains.  Lucky me.

Never done a race report before so here goes.  Have not done a race since springtime and for some reason I was feeling very nervous.  I tried to keep busy yesterday and not think about it, but it did not help much.  Got up early at 5:50 for a yummy breakfast of toast and apple juice.  Got there at 7:30, half hour before start.  Did a little warm up job, trip to the bathroom before the lines got long and then some stretching.  It was pretty chilly out, I'm glad I brought a big coat.  My sister-in-law arrived with her family to come run the race with me.  It was fun to have them there, my brother took a lot of pictures with his paparazzi camera.

 We started right at the front and that was a good choice for me, I felt like I had a great start.  Ran in fourth position for more then half the race.  Then someone came sneaking up on me when we got to the hilly part.  I feel like hills always tend to be my weakness.  She was pretty tiny and I could see she just did not have to hull as much "muchness" us the hill as me.  We ran the last mile neck and neck passing each other back and forth a bit.  After we were out of moves we just ran side by side till the finish line fighting for fourth place.  When we turned the corner and saw the finish line about 50 M away we both kicked in to full sprints.  I gave it everything I had but she got ahead of me and finished just a few seconds ahead.  I was actually ok with her beating me because I knew I gave it absolutely everything I had.  I was really happy with 5th overall.  It was a women's only race by the way.  

My time was 31:27 for 6k or 3.72 miles.  That is 8:25 AP.  That was great, I ran this same race course last year with a time of 33:46 and 16th overall.  So took more then 2 minutes off my time.  I'm happy.  I felt like I was running a lot faster then that pace, some people were saying on their Garmins they measured the course a little longer.  I don't have a Garmin, not quite that awesome yet.  But plan to get one for Christmas.   Probably the only 6k race I have ever heard of, sort of a different distance to race.  I got a medal for 2nd in my age division, that was cool.  This was fun, I should do more races.  Now that I have this one out of the way, hopefully I won't get so nervous for the Provo Halloween 1/2 in two weeks.

P.S.  I would have added in a cool picture but have no idea how to do that yet.