Runnin' O' the Green Race Report

OldManRunner · Posted: Sun Mar 13, 2005 9:43 am

This is a 5-mile run that kicks off the "spring" racing series here in Rochester, NY. About 30 degrees here this morning, and we've still got a foot or more of snow on the ground in most places. Not very spring-like. Regardless, the sun was shinning, the roads were dry, and the wind wasn't blowing, so it was actually perfect conditions for racing. There were probably somewhere between 800 and 1000 competitors, including several in kilts.

After a lot of mass movement back and forth because of confusion regarding where the starting line was, I found myself about 4 - 5 rows back from the front at the start. Surprisingly, there were no speeches thanking anyone, or telling us about the charity being supported, or anything else. Just "runners set, go!". Within the first 3 seconds a tall guy two rows in front of me and three feet or so to my left tripped and fell, and a woman right behind him fell over him. I paused, thinking I'd go back to help them up and make sure they were ok when I realized that doing so would probably just make things worse, and that I'd get trampled by the crowd. I have no idea if or how many other people fell over these two, but it was really weird. Something I've read about often, but never seen happen before.

A lot of people were passing me from the get go, but this is one of those "popular" races in the area that draws a lot of marginal runners who take off fast, and then are reduced to walking after the first two miles. I ran a 36:26 in this race last year, and although I was pleased with that at the time, I feel that I'm in much better shape right now than I was at that time, and was hoping to run close to 35:00 flat or maybe even a few seconds below. My breathing felt pretty good during this first mile: hard (but that's always the case in the 1st mile), but not outrageous. So even though lots of people were passing me, I felt I was running the right pace, and settled in. This is a very flat course that follows a river for the most part, with portions winding through the University of Rochester campus. I hit the first mile in 6:48, and thought, "great, that was a strong first mile, and I'm right on track to come in a bit under 35:00."

I conciously let myself ease off pace by what I hoped was no more than 10 seconds per mile, and chugged along into the second mile. Meanwhile, folks are still passing me left and right, but I'm not worrying about them...just worrying about my own pace. I'm looking around for the two mile mark so I can hit my watch and check my pace, but I never see it, and glancing at my watch I realize that I must have passed it already. About this time I realize that I'm feeling pretty bad, and my legs seem to be moving slower and slower. I'm breathing harder than I should be, and would guess that I've slowed to something like a 7:30 pace. We make a hairpin turn around at the half way point, and at least I get to see that there are still a lot of people behind me, many of whom are still in the "appear to be pretty fit" category. Still, I'm dying here and can tell that I'm continuing to slow down. I happen to glance at the pavement, and see a short line, some illegible writing, and a "3", all in rust red spray paint. Ah, I realize, this must be the 3 mile mark, and boy they sure have done their best to make it invisible! My watch reads 14:58 (if I remember right...I was too tired to hit my watch) since the 1 mile mark, so I've averaged 7:29 pace over the past two miles. I'm bumming out, and just wish the race would be over. I can tell that I'm still slowing down throughout mile 4, and wouldn't be surprised if I hit 8:00 pace at some points during that mile...I was breathing hard, and at the same time running at just a brisk training pace for me. What the *(&*(*()*)_^$$$?? I managed to catch site of the four mile mark, and after some confusion regarding how to read my watch I saw that I was already at something like 29:30, and that my aspirations for a 35:00 time were laughable. I did manage to pick up the pace during the final mile, and probably got all the way up to an awsome 7:15 for that final leg. When I crossed the line and saw my time, all I could do was shake my head in disgust.

For the next 10 minutes my lungs and trachea were burning, and I had a headache from breathing the cold air as hard as I had for as long as I had. My lungs haven't felt that bad after a race in a long time (maybe this same race last year?). Maybe its just that I haven't raced in so long, but right now I'm just feeling so disappointed and disgusted with my performance. To have actually run more slowly than last year, while having believed that I was in considerably better shape than I was at this point last year. I know that it's really not a bad time, and that many people would be happy to have run it, but I feel like I've worked so hard over the past 8 weeks, racking up the mileage - even on days that I didn't want to run, pissing off my wife because of my long runs on the weekends, actually costing myself money because I'm self-employed and any time when I'm running and not working is time that I'm not earning any money. And all for nothing. I'm at the same damn point that I was last year, and last year I went on to run a 3:27 marathon Memorial Day weekend. That's 7 minutes off the BQ time I've been working towards for the past two years, and four minutes slower than I ran later in the fall. I've been planning on running the same Memorial Day marathon this spring, with honest hopes of hitting my 3:20 target, but after today's performance I guess I feel like I have no reason to expect that I would improve upon last year's 3:27. And frankly, I don't feel like running a marathon just for the experience. I've run four already, and I guess I feel like if I'm not ready to run a good time, what am I bothering with the weeks after weeks of time consuming training for?! I ran a VDOT 44 performance today, and I need better than a VDOT 47 marathon performance to BQ by Memorial Day Weekend. Calling that "unlikely" is an understatement. Why am I so slow!!!!!!?

Right now I'm thinking of bailing on a spring marathon, and instead focusing on building my speed at shorter distances throughout the spring. That'll be nice because it's allow me to keep my mileage more manageable, too, and I'll actually have time to do other things in life. The hard part is knowing that I can't make this decision, and then change my mind two weeks from now. I'll already have fallen way off of my marathon distance training regimine, and it'll be too late to resurrect any hope of a good race. Guess I'll sleep on it. I'm done for today, regardless.

Sorry to rant at you all. It's just been a bad day.