Run Turkey Run 5K this morning. About 24 degrees at the start, but only a slight breeze. Warmed up 2 miles on the course, and I'm so glad I did. I ran this last year but I forgot how far we went before turning around. This course starts in downtown, goes through streets with the old houses in town, then turns and comes back. While warming up I wore two pairs pants, 3 shirts and a jacket. After getting warm I ditched the pants and put on shorts, and went with a short sleeve tech shirt and a long sleeve half zip tech shirt, thin cotton gloves, and a thin tech warm hat. Perfect.
The start is downtown and from last year I learned that GPS signal goes out from the "tall" buildings (4-5 stories) so I tried to just pick a good pace. That is tough to do while surrounded by kids and other slower runners. After a few blocks we turn and ditch downtown and head into the neighborhood. I was able to maintain a better pace, but it was too slow. At the first mile I picked it up a bit but was still struggling to keep it lower. All the way I was picking people off left & right. That is sooooo fun! Love it. The third mile I knew I had a lot of gas in the tank so I put the pedal down as much as I could. We got back into downtown and two right turns were coming up. Everyone turned on a street that seemed early, but whatever. I upped my speed at the turn, then on the last turn I upped it again. I had a good push to the end and was shocked when I saw 19:0x on the clock. WOW! I really went way faster than I thought. Amazing. Then I heard a few people say "too bad the course was short." What the??? Checked the watch, and 2.98 on the watch. We all turned one street too early. I talked to the winner and he said the cyclist leading him caused the mix up. He turned early, the leader followed, then everybody followed after which makes sense. I was moving that last 1/2 mile so I think I would've had a good time. Based on a 3 mile race and a time of 19:06, my pace is 6:22 which equals a 19:48 5K. Major bummer that I couldn't get an official 5K time. There are so few flat 5Ks in Billings that I don't get this chance very often.
Had a great time, then an hour after the 5K started I did the 1 mile race (the official RRCA Montana championship mile race...but nobody really showed up). The clock had me at 5:46 and 6th place overall, 1st place in age division. Nobody ran the 1 mile, obviously, but I'll take it. In the 5K I finished 25th out of 2019 finishers, and the 1 mile 6th out of 418. Not too shabby for an old guy, but clearly the high school cross country kids sat this one out.
After reflecting for a few days, and thinking how I felt after my 5:46 mile, I know I can do so much more with the 5K. At the end I didn't feel close to puking my guts out or feeling like I would fall over, and from everything I've seen, that's what a proper 5K is supposed to feel like. Shoot, I didn't even feel like that after the mile. I need to learn how to race. There are only a handful of 5Ks in Billings all year, so it's tough to learn how, but I'm hopeful.
Happy Thanksgiving blog buddies!
Splits: 6:37, 6:32, 6:11.
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