I ran my very first 10k this morning. I’ve done the distance many times in training, but this was my first race at that distance.

I approached the morning with quite a bit of uncertainty. I had run a 5 mile race last October with intentions of going fast - fast for me at the time being 8 min/mile pace. Yeah. It’s not fast by any means, but running has never been my forte. Anyway, to make a long story short, I tried pushing through on the hilly, rocky course despite my cramps but ended up pretty short of my goal. I ended up running something like 8:20 pace. I remember being pretty disappointed with my time overall. The only thing that gave me any comfort was seeing that I averaged 171 BPM on my heart rate monitor and knowing that I realistically couldn’t have run that much harder (my measured max HR is 189).

So I wasn’t all too thrilled about running the 10k hard the night before the race and into race morning. I don’t really like that feeling that my heart is going to come through my chest. I was scared that I would be very disappointed with my time and that I would not have confidence going into my first half iron-distance race just a couple of weeks away. But I was already signed up and would have felt worse knowing that I paid $30 for a t-shirt that I wouldn’t even be able to wear, so there I was.

I decided at the start line that I was just going to run it. Not race it, but just run it a bit harder than I do during training (I probably run at 9:30ish pace during training, for what it’s worth). My friend is at the start line with me. He had troubles getting his heart rate monitor to show a reading. I was glad that mine was working alright. Someone was making announcements over the PA system, but I couldn’t hear anything in the crowd of almost 4000. Eventually, I could hear the start of the national anthem and soon after that, the horn blew and we were off.

Nobody really seeded themselves appropriately. To their credit, there weren’t any signs signaling where you should be standing based on what pace you wanted to run at. Still, there were many folks way too close to the front than they should have been. So we start off pretty slowly. I can see that my friend is pretty frustrated at this point and that he just wants to unleash (he’s a much faster runner than I). I tell him to have a good race, smile and say that I’ll see him in an hour and a half or so. He replies with something along the lines of that the bus is leaving in an hour. We had carpooled to the race together, so so much for totally loafing. He races ahead and I keep plodding along.

The first mile was really crowded. I ended up weaving between bunches of people. Everyone is kind of shoulder to shoulder and I’m surprised that I didn’t see anyone fall. I felt like I was taking my first mile out pretty easy, all things considered. It was really too crowded to run too hard, which was just fine by me. I glance down at my heart rate monitor which tells me that I’m dead. @%#$! Either I don’t have a good connection on my strap or I was picking up my friend’s HR strap at the start line. Oh well. After a short while, I run up on the first mile marker on the course. I take a look down at my watch and see 8:01. Guess I wasn’t taking it out too easy after all. I was comfortable and decided to just keep that pace going until maybe the 2-3 mile marker. At the half way point, I’d reassess where I was at. It was during mile 2 that I noticed that there were way too many folks going way faster than they should have been. Now, I generally don’t like judging people solely based on looks, but I couldn’t help but think that to myself as I passed tons of people wearing Rocky type sweats with inefficient running gaits and breathing like they were just held underwater for two minutes straight. I imagine telling them that there are still 5 miles in the race and that they might want to save a little for later. But nothing is said and I keep plodding along.

Mile marker 2 come up and I look down to see 15:30. What? Did I read that right? I double check the number and redo the math in my head. Sure enough, I just ran that second mile in 7:30. Woah. Maybe you’re a little too excited there big guy. Maybe you need to save some for the end. But I’m still feeling ok at this point. I have no idea what my heart rate is because my watch is still showing 00. I tell myself to just keep pace, I guess, and we’ll see what happens at the half way mark.

Mile 3 approaches at the top of a slight hill. I have flashbacks to the hills back in the 5 mile race that I did in October and tell myself to go take it easy. People proceeded to pass me going up the hill and I proceeded to pass most of those people shortly after the top of the hill. I skip the aid station and approach the mile 3 marker. 23:00. Still not cramping at this point and feeling pretty good. Ok. I guess all that running from October until now actually did something. But by now, I’m too far into it to have started out any faster. And I still don’t know if I’m going to blow up later, so I just keep on pace.

Miles four and five go by and I’m still clipping off 7:30 miles. Still feeling good and only about a mile to go. I turn it up just a notch. The field has really thinned out at this point. I see a few people on the sides of the road stretching. A few more people on the sides walking. Not sure what happened to them, but I hope that nothing is seriously wrong. I clipped off my last mile at 7:20 and make my “sprint” to the end to see 48 minute and change on the official clock. I was pretty happy. I was thinking that I’d run about 53 minutes, that I would have been really happy with 49:59:59 and here I was almost 2 minute better then that. And to make things better, I remember about 20 minutes later than it took me some time to even get across the start line. So I check my watch (since I started that as I crossed the starting mat) and see that I ran 47:04. I’m beaming at this point (although secretly a little upset that if I had knew that I was that close, I’d have run just a tad faster than 1.2 miles to get into the 46 number).

So all in all, it was a great day. The event was great and well run. The celebratory breakfast of IHOP pancakes and eggs was even better. I’m looking forward to my 1/2 on May 8th.