Broad St. Run - Big PR!

This was a breakthrough race. I had no idea I was capable of throwing this kind of time down with the light training I've been doing and lack of sleep due to stress at work and school. I honestly couldn't be happier.

I even got a little coverage on Philly.com (picture #23) which my mom found. She then sent me an email with this as the subject line haha

So a little about the race - I was a little nervous going into it. I didn't sleep much this past week. I only ran 2x before Sunday (a short interval workout on Tuesday morning and 50min steady run on Friday morning) and I did NOTHING else athletic. I had resigned to the fact that I would run a 1:02-1:04, and I was OK with it. Sunday I got up and hopped on the subway. I actually thought the race started at 8am, so I went through my routine a little early and then got in the corral to realize that it started at 8:30 haha. So I went through an abbreviated second warm up (maybe that is the key??). Anyway, I was in the corral right behind the elite runners. A co-coach and friend Darryl was running with them. Despite looking for him, I didn't see him before or after the race.

The first mile is fast and downhill. I didn't feel like I was pushing that hard, I honestly thought I would be around a 6:05pace until I looked up and saw that the clock read 5:25. YIKES! I knew that would come back to bite me. But on the plus side, I only had to hold 9 more 6min miles and I'd reach my goal.  I pumped the brakes a little bit and kept rolling. Mile 2 was 5:40, so much more in control. I was shocked how good I felt. I hit the 3rd mile in 17:07, which is pretty close to my 5k PR pace. I was worried what would happen if I kept it up, but figured why the hell not just lay it out there and hold on... I was hovering right around 5:50 for miles 3-8. Not much excitement, except I saw my mom at mile 6. Mile 9 was tough. I was hanging with the 7th place female runner and she broke away. I knew I couldn't hang with her, so I let up a little bit mentally. There weren't many other runners around, so running behind I slowed to 6:11 for the 9th mile. Seeing that upset me a little because I had been sub 6min pace for the whole race, so I tried to pick it up for stretch. I also saw the Philly Tri Club tent and got some cheers, so that helped me pick it up. A 6:01 final mile put me across the line in 58:30. I did get outkicked by 2 guys right in the last 50meters, but hey - I was WAY ahead of where I thought I would be. My average HR on the day was a mild 194 - I don't know how I don't blow up...

If these results aren't proof that a little speed work goes a LONG way, I don't know what is. Even with a drastic drop off in training volume, I've seen improvement AND almost no loss of endurance... Here is what my training looked like for the 4 weeks leading up to Broad St. - nothing over 8:15/week!

 I have a small 5k in the end of May, but that's the last running race until the fall. For the next 6-8 weeks it's going to be all about the bike.