On Sunday May 4th I ran my second race ever: The 29th Annual Broad Street Run in Philadelphia. My last race, the Great Aloha Run, was 8.2miles; the Broad Street Run is 10miles. It’s not much of a difference, but it’s enough… especially when I haven’t ran a race in 2 years. I was in a lot better shape in Hawaii, and I hadn’t realized that until I was assessing my training.
That being said, I did much better than I hoped to do. My goal was to come in under 1hr 20min. If I came in 1hr 20-25 I’d be content, and anything over that I’d be disappointed. From mile 1-4.5, my left calf felt like dead weight. I had been dreading this, as this had happened often during my training. I guess I’m getting old. No matter how much or how little I stretched before a practice jog didn’t seem to have much correlation with whether my calf tightened during a practice jog. I stretched the hell out of my legs before the race began, and it happened anyway. I pushed through that pain/annoyance and it seemed to have gone away or disappeared into the back of my consciousness.
Also around this time I reasoned that, based on my stopwatch and some math, I could best my goal and come in under 1hr 15min. This seemed unrealistic before the race, but seemed very real at this point. Even though no one knew of my new goal besides me, I knew I would feel let down, even embarrassed, if I didn’t achieve that time.
After running around City Hall, the only part of the course that wasn’t a straight line, I could feel myself trying harder to maintain my 7:30/mile pace. I hit the 1hr mark at exactly the same moment I hit 8miles. It meant I had to do two 7:30 miles in a row to finish the race if I wanted to reach my goal.
I hit mile 9 at 1hr 8min, and knew I had just screwed myself. I didn’t expect to be able to run a sub 7min mile after clocking in at 8. I pulled it off though thanks to a combination of Strawberry & Banana Power Gel, adrenaline, old school Thursday coming through my headphones, seeing Barb on the sidelines cheering, and having a nice downward slope during the last 1/4 mile in the Navy Yard. I ran my last mile in 6min 48sec to come in at a final time of 1h4 14min 48sec.
How I finished:
Overall: 2,388 out of 19,112
Sex: 1,940 out of 9,821
Division (M 25-29): 364 out of 1,775
Age Grade: 59.3%*
*I would’ve qualified as a “Local Class” if I scored 60%
And as for Global Warming:
It’s real. Our lives will not be the same. It will be the end of an age.
That being said, I did much better than I hoped to do. My goal was to come in under 1hr 20min. If I came in 1hr 20-25 I’d be content, and anything over that I’d be disappointed. From mile 1-4.5, my left calf felt like dead weight. I had been dreading this, as this had happened often during my training. I guess I’m getting old. No matter how much or how little I stretched before a practice jog didn’t seem to have much correlation with whether my calf tightened during a practice jog. I stretched the hell out of my legs before the race began, and it happened anyway. I pushed through that pain/annoyance and it seemed to have gone away or disappeared into the back of my consciousness.
Also around this time I reasoned that, based on my stopwatch and some math, I could best my goal and come in under 1hr 15min. This seemed unrealistic before the race, but seemed very real at this point. Even though no one knew of my new goal besides me, I knew I would feel let down, even embarrassed, if I didn’t achieve that time.
After running around City Hall, the only part of the course that wasn’t a straight line, I could feel myself trying harder to maintain my 7:30/mile pace. I hit the 1hr mark at exactly the same moment I hit 8miles. It meant I had to do two 7:30 miles in a row to finish the race if I wanted to reach my goal.
I hit mile 9 at 1hr 8min, and knew I had just screwed myself. I didn’t expect to be able to run a sub 7min mile after clocking in at 8. I pulled it off though thanks to a combination of Strawberry & Banana Power Gel, adrenaline, old school Thursday coming through my headphones, seeing Barb on the sidelines cheering, and having a nice downward slope during the last 1/4 mile in the Navy Yard. I ran my last mile in 6min 48sec to come in at a final time of 1h4 14min 48sec.
How I finished:
Overall: 2,388 out of 19,112
Sex: 1,940 out of 9,821
Division (M 25-29): 364 out of 1,775
Age Grade: 59.3%*
*I would’ve qualified as a “Local Class” if I scored 60%
I also believe that this run could alternately be called the "Put 22,000 White People in the 'Hood and Watch them Flee to the Safey of the Navy " Run.
And as for Global Warming:
It’s real. Our lives will not be the same. It will be the end of an age.
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