New 5k PR

A few weeks back, my dad signed me up for a 5k. It's kind of like a corporate challenge, and I was running on his company's team with him and my stepmom. I kind of wrote it off as a fun run because I have been focusing on long runs and have done absolutely no speed work since the spring.

Then my dad said that if I beat this one guy that works for his company he'd give me $100. So I was a little bit more motivated. My previous best time in the 5k was 22:29 from last Thanksgiving. I figured I might squeeze in under 23 minutes, but I wasn't even sure that was possible.

The weather was perfect: 55 degrees, no wind, and partly cloudy. The course was mostly flat with two out and backs, so it looked like a plus sign with one side missing. I lined up right in front, hoping the faster runners would push me to run fast, which is what happened at the race last Thanksgiving. There were about 700 runners there today, and that was another reason I lined up in front, because I absolutely detest the lack of race etiquette at 5ks.

I had my Garmin set to yell at me if my pace dropped below 7:30. I hit the first mile at 6:47 and was really surprised. Mile 2 had the hill and that's where I passed the guy from my dad's company that he wanted me to beat. I ran the second mile in 6:47 and was surprised again. I couldn't believe I was running that fast. I tried to go all out, but I slowed a bit in the third mile. I was getting tired, but I just kept focusing on people in front of me and tried to keep up or pass them. I ran the third mile in 6:59. I sprinted hard to the finish and crossed at 21:12. My chip time was 21:09.

I even ended up placing first in my age group. Well actually I placed first in the 30-34 age group, since my dad doesn't know how old I am and said I was 30 on the registration form. But I also placed first in the 25-29 age group by about 14 seconds. I asked the timing people to correct my age on the official race results.

I'm really happy and not exactly sure how things came together for me to hit that time. I didn't think training for long distances would do anything to improve speed for shorter races.

There were a lot of people pushing kids in strollers, and there were more double strollers than singles. It would have been fun to push Logan, but he was pretty cranky this morning and he has been going with me on most of my runs in the last two weeks.