Law Week Fun Run 8k

Law Week Fun Run 8k – Start 71F 90% humidity (yuck!) 483 finishers.

1 5:21 159 5th place – I went out a little too fast
2 5:44 173 couple guys pass me as I slow – 7th
3 5:54 174 couple more guys pass me – 9th
4 6:08 174 maintain position – 3 mile marker is at the bottom of a hill so this mile is slowed by the hill at the beginning.
4.97 5:50(6:00 pace) 177

Finish – 28:57 9th place overall 2nd for my age group. 38 second PR for the distance, 2:14 faster than same race 1 year ago (about the same weather).

Not a well executed race overall – I compared it to the same race a year ago and I kept my heartrate ~3-4 bpm higher last year which suggests I should have gone ~50-60 seconds faster for the race for the same guts as I put in last year. I was not at all excited about running the humid weather and as much as I wanted to be psyched to do my best – somewhere after mile 1 – I had difficulty maintaining the motivation. In hindsight I think I should have run by heartrate instead of targeting splits as I was just unsure how to adjust my pace for the weather – I seem to run faster by heartrate and ignoring the splits until the finish but for some reason I convinced myself to run this race targeting milemarker splits – didn’t work.

But the race was fun – met several fellow Striders – a running club I joined a month or so back but haven’t done much with as of yet. I find myself becoming known for the somewhat analytical blog :-) even by people I haven’t met before.

I did try heat acclimating for 2 days as prep for this race hoping for a colder race (ran in sweats 13 miles on Thurday and 7 on Friday), but with the heat of the race there is no way to tell if it did any good. Sure wish I could get a cold day to see the impact but I don’t see one in the forecast anytime before next weekend.

3 weeks to Boston - getting pretty excited!!