Finally getting around to my race recap from this weekend!
Sunday morning with a 5:40 am start I woke up nervous and already mentally beating myself down. Justin and I had been out the night prior for the football game and didn’t get to bed until around 1:30 am. Despite the fact that I was wired I couldn’t help thinking that I was going to crash and wouldn’t have any energy for the race. I had been crazy excited for a PR so waking up feeling slightly deflated off the bat was hard to cope with. I grabbed some granola, yogurt and a piece of bread to snack on while we drove the 45 minutes down to La Porte, and we were off.
I am usually the kind of person that likes to get to my races SUPER early. However, for my last race we arrived a good 2 hours prior to the start and I was going crazy waiting to begin the race so I wanted to cut it a little closer this time around. We arrived about 40 minutes from race time. Just enough time for me NOT to stress about parking which was held at a high school just a short walk from the start.
I made my way over to the starting area and immediately got in line for the port-o-potties. I was already beginning to stress about time and figured I should do a quick bathroom run before my warm up. While in line a lady asked me if I’d ran the race before. I told her no and she preceded to talk to me about how nervous she was for the hill/bridge. To be completely honest, I did absolutely no research on this race prior to signing up. I knew there was a bridge but so far, from what I have seen in MY area of Texas there are no “hills”. She continued on and the negative thoughts in my head got a little louder. I had wanted to run the race as one of my strong training runs for my marathon in a few weeks and I figured I’d be able to get a PR and leave with some added confidence. My grand idea of gaining a PR and running a solid race started to slip away.
After my bathroom break I did my warm up, running for about 10 minutes before stretching and bouncing around a bit. The weather was in the low 60’s and with the morning sun not hitting us with heat just yet at 7:30, the race conditions were perfect.
The race commentator called us all up to the starting line to get ready. There was honor paid to some veterans followed by a long silence for those effected by the terrorist attacks in Paris. Standing amongst a sea of people bowing their heads, it was nice to be reminded that despite the hatred that occurred Friday night there is always far more love and support to outweigh it.
Following the moment of silence the National Anthem was sung and the push towards the starting line picked up a bit.
I placed myself where I usually like to be, somewhere in the first third of runners but not directly in front. My original goal for the race had been to come in around a 1:43-1:45. I was hoping I could hold a steady 7:50 pace for the majority of the race based on how I have been training lately. However, after all the second guessing running through my head I reminded myself to go slower if it felt like I was pushing too hard. I had no idea where the bridge was going to be and I didn’t want to be dead and devoid of energy arriving at it.
The gun went off and the slow crawl to the stating line began. I immediately regretted my decision to not start closer to the front line as it seemed like all the people in front of me were chugging along at a 10 minute pace. It takes very little for me to get angry/cranky in a race and it took a lot in me not to huff and choose some comments while making my way around a lot of people. The first half mile I ended up scampering around tons of people and ,as the mental case that I am, I couldn’t help thinking that the extra effort of having to go around so many was going to catch up with me later.
I clocked in my first mile at a 7:37. I was happy with this as it didn’t feel too difficult. I felt slightly uncomfortable and out of rhythm but I feel this is the usual for a first mile so I didn’t worry too much about it. The next two miles felt fairly similar and I came in at a 7:38 and 7:39. I was happy to be running consistent splits but my legs still didn’t feel like they were finding their groove quite right.
Just before mile four there was a brief point running under some roads and a small sloping hill. I held a small glimmer of hope that this would be the only hill we were going to come upon. I was very very wrong.
Around mile 5 the view of the bridge became clear and I could see the other runners off in the distance slowly making there way UP. I’ve been in Texas about a year now and taken full advantage of running on exceptionally flat surfaces. As I looked up at the hill I could not help but think how long it had been since I’d faced one, let alone one so steep. I made the decision right then to “give up” my PR, or at least take the stress out of it. It probably wasn’t likely and if I wanted to finish the race without killing myself completely and mentally breaking down I just needed to do what I could and accept the outcome for the day.
I chugged along the hill. It had been forever since I’d ran one, but I went at a comfortable pace and without trying desperately to keep at a certain time it didn’t end up being as horrific as I thought. I focused on keeping my breath steady and making sure I wasn’t exerting everything I had as I knew we would have to loop around and do it all over again. I checked my pace at the mile beep and saw I’d run an 8:28. At this point I wasn’t worrying too much about pace so I didn’t really upset me.
The next two miles (7 and 8) went pretty quickly as they were downhill and then it was right back at the big, bad, ugly, bridge again.
Miles 9 and 10 were difficult, coming to the steep part again, but I was encouraged by what felt like a steady pace and feeling like I still had energy in my tank. I passed a girl who was struggling and when I started to make my way by her she tried for a few meters to keep up with me. I’m usually one to shoot out the gate and get passed later on in the race so it felt nice to for once be on the other end and feel like I had a strong set of legs ready to finish out the last few miles.
Mile 11 was downhill and whereas I usually don’t just “let myself go”, my feet were tired enough that I kind of just went with the pull of gravity coming in at a 7:22. It was also at this point that I started getting a lot of cheers from people. As you go over the bridge twice, I got to pass all those still making their way over the firs time and everyone was super encouraging. I was one of the front girls so I got a lot of “You go girl!” and “You’re so close!” and “You’re the sixth girl! Keep pushing”. It was a nice little confidence booster to keep me going at what was probably the most exhausting part of the race.
By the last few miles I was feeling the need to go to the bathroom rather badly so the idea of pushing it seemed pretty out of the question. I had ran a very reserved race up to that point, and once again feeling like I was no longer stressing so hard for a PR I decided I’d rather finish the race at a consistent pace than stop at a bathroom and try to sprint it in to make up for the time that I stopped.
As with most races my last two miles felt excruciatingly long but even by the end I was amazed at how strong my legs felt. I crossed the finish at a 1:41:32, a new PR ad first in my age group. I was blown away. For the briefest of moments I thought about the fact that I could have pushed a little harder had it not been for my GI issues. In the end though, I was thrilled with my time, something i realized I probably would have never gotten had I not stopped fixating on each and every mile pace.
Sometimes all you need is to relax and things will fall into place 🙂
Crooked Lines 