Interesting Race Today - Strange Results

Today was a really different day, it started out in the low 50's with 95% humidity and very very foggy. By race time the fog had only lifted slightly and the temps still hovered around 55. It just wasn't quite heavy enough to say it was raining but you could feel the water particles floating around in the air, very different.

They started the 5k and 12k groups off together, don't ask me where they came up with the idea of a 12k race. I just know it was a good distance to include in my taper before the hunt begins next week for Marathon Maniac status.

I was surprised at the .5 mile point to have one of our quicker club runners shout my name...from BEHIND me!!! Well seems she had been out running before the race and had done 4 or 5 miles already. She ran with me for about half a mile making me feel good...that "I" was running with her at "her" pace. But alas, she said I'm going to take off now....and left me in her dirt...drats!!!!! In looking at things when we finished though, she only finished 8 minutes ahead of me.

I was able to run to the turn around point for the 5k folks and at that point I walked thru one of the two water stops, the other being waaaaaayyyyy out at our turnaround point, at the 6k marker. I ran at least a mile and then walked for a minute or less from that time until the turnaround. I did the 6k turnaround in exactly 40 minutes. I knew though that I had started very very fast for an old fart and I would have to really find something deep to get equal or negative splits today.

Well it wasn't to be. I did meet another runner that surprised the dickens out of me. We were between the 8k and 9k points and she came up on my left and said "Come on you are doing great". She surprised me to the point that I had to walk for just a short bit..it was unnerving. Then we seesawed to the 10k marker and she caught up again and we introduced ourselves and from that point we ran in together, finishing with the same times I believe. As it turns out her boyfriend was a former employee of my company and while we had never met face to face we both recognized the others name....strange yet again. He ran the 12k and finished in 1:05 I think.

Anyway as I mentioned the negative splits weren't to be for me today....my chip time was 1:24:09. Just 4 minutes off the pace for negative splits. My pace for the day was 11:10 and with the exception of the recent 5k training runs that I've been doing without any walking, this is the best pace time for a race that I've had since mid-May when I PR'ed at a 5k with a pace of 10:40. I calculated my 5k pace today and discovered that I had a 32:30 for the first 5k for a pace of 10:27. When you see the times you will see....again..for an old fart I was moving faster than I normally do.

Before I post my times...I want to say that Bonnie also ran the 12k with me today, she did a time of 1:48, though we don't knwo what her official time was and are waiting on final times to be posted. She did great, even though her pace today was slower than the 15k she did two weeks ago...I attribute that to the humidity that we ran in.

My numbers:

Total Distance: 7.53 miles (according to Garmin)
Total Time: 1:24:09
Pace: 11:10

Lap 1: 9:51 (woohoo...too fast a start..but it looks good and felt good too!!)
Lap 2: 10:53
Lap 3: 10:42
Lap 4: 11:44
Lap 5: 11:17
Lap 6: 11:41
Lap 7: 12:23 (this seemed to be all uphill on the way back to the finish line)
.53 Mi: 10:25

Overall, I had a PR since this was the first time I've run this distance....but I think more importantly was the significance of the pace I was able to maintain, that made me feel really good.