Tuesday, November 4, 2014

Phoenix 3TV 10k

Sunday was the Phoenix 3TV 10k.  I was happily surprised by two things:
1. The weather was fantastic.  It's been so hot up until last week, and it was in the low 60s and breezy all morning.  Perfect weather for a run!
2. The biggest event of this race was the 10k, instead of the Half.  The t-shirt was even centered around it.  This made me feel a little better about changing events.

I ended up working Saturday, and had a super draining week, so I woke up Sunday morning feeling a little more tired than I had hoped.  I was up by 5:30am for a 9:00am start, and force fed myself a tofu/sweet potato breakfast burrito and a small berry smoothie.  I love eating, but damn it's hard to eat that much that early.  I was determined not to fatigue in this race though.  For the majority of the training season, I capped out about 2 miles shy of my total mileage because I didn't get up early enough to eat enough to fuel me.  I needed food that would last me until 10:00am, with a 600 calorie loss in there.  Luckily, the 10k started an hour and a half after the Half, so I got to "sleep in."

My leg had been hurting off and on, so I taped it with KT tape just in case.  Grabbed my tutu and my water and we headed downtown on the light rail. The race started/ended at CityScape so it was nice and conveniently close.
Tutus!

There were 1,100 people in the 10k so the start line was pretty crowded.  When the bell went off it was a little bit like being corralled at first.  Once we got through the first mile things opened up a bit and it was a little easier to keep my own pace.  Started off at a 10:20 pace, which was comfortable.  Since we had been working up mileage towards 13, we had been averaging a 10:45 pace, so this was a bit faster.  I am usually fearful about starting too fast, since we've been known to start off at 9:50 instead.

At just over 3 miles, Christi and I parted ways.  She wasn't feeling well, and my lungs/legs/mind had finally synced up and I was ready to push forward.  I also mentally made a note that in the end, I paid $70 for a 10k, so I better bust my ass to make it financially worth it.  Oh the thought process behind the poor... ha! But it worked. My leg hurt at times, but it seems like every time I noticed it, I must have made a shift in my running form because the pain went away. I'm doing something, but I don't know what.  PF Changs I had no problem. So I'm not sure if this is just residual pain from rolling my ankle and I'm subconsciously doing something to "protect" it, or if I have some funky thing I'm doing in my stride. TBD.

I had hoped to best last year's 10k time (1:04:00), but I finished a little slower than that.
Official race time: 1:05:50
But I felt really good about this time.  With everything that has gone wrong in training for this race, the entire 6.2 miles felt good. Really good. It's been awhile since that has happened.  When I finished, I waited at the finish line for Christi to cross so I could cheer her on.  While I was waiting, I watched a woman finish and she was sobbing as she crossed.  Her husband ran out from the crowd to cry with her and congratulate her for finishing it.  It was one of the most beautiful moments I had ever seen, so I cried too.  I know that feeling.  The feeling that you weren't sure you were going to make it, but you pushed yourself farther than you thought you ever possibly could. I felt that after my first half.  And even here at the 10k, I felt a little of that again.

Time to give my legs a couple weeks "off."  I use that term loosely since I'm currently working two jobs (and on my feet for both of them), and I plan to do a lot of cross-training and weight lifting in between.  But, my poor calf hasn't gotten much relief since I repeatedly rolled my ankle and then ran on it.  We went to the gym last night, and I was relieved to see that even though we were tired, we showed up! If we had run the half we more than likely would have taken the first part of the week off to recover.  Switching to the 10k allowed us to move forward, something I'm really happy about.

Upcoming:
Long Beach Turkey Trot - 10k (Thanksgiving Day)
Hot Chocolate 15k - December 
TBD - Obstacle course race 2015! Time to get buff and shit!

Running may not love me, but it seems to be one of the few things that keeps me sane lately in this crazy schedule I'm running. Channeling all of my stress into working out at least lets me feel like I can control something right now.  I found this motivational poster last week, and it's my favorite I've ever found because it most certainly hits the nail right on the head.