The Derby

The Berbee Derby that is.  With the family abandoning me for Thanksgiving and a 6-mile run on the schedule for the week, it only made sense to run the 10k at the aforementioned Derby.  I've known about this race for a number of years, and always assumed it was a pretty small local event.  Turns out almost 2,000 came out for the 10k, and another 3,500+ for the 5k.  Not so small.

As far as I'm concerned the weather was near perfect for a 10k.  Upper 30's and overcast.  I could have done without the wind, but it wasn't nearly as bad as I had feared prerace.

I've spent more time in the last 5+ hours since I've finished analyzing this race than I likely have for any other "largely meaningless" race.  I still don't know what to make of it.

First off, I don't think I've ever finished a run race feeling like I didn't leave everything I had out there.  Today I did, and I still ran 3-4 minutes faster than I thought reasonably possible given my current fitness.

Given the above, I think I let my Garmin hold me back throughout the entire race. I only looked at it at the mile markers, but it kept telling me I was going faster than what I felt (at least prerace) was sustainable.

The splits:

Mile 1:  8:56 - Was very congested to start, ran at a comfortable pace.  Time was at the fast end of what I thought possible for the entire race.

Mile 2:  8:29 - "You're an idiot"  I said to myself, perhaps a bit too loudly, when I saw this split.  But I was still comfortable, and the wind was still at our back.

Mile 3:  8:27 - By this point it wasn't easy, but I was nowhere near hurting either.

Mile 4: 8:34 - Back into the wind now.  I did my best to find people to draft behind, but all the bigger dudes around me seemed to be slowing down.

Mile 5: 8:32 - Still into the wind, been on the Cap. City Trail now since about the 3-1/2 mile mark.  I don't remember this trail being this hilly.

Mile 6:  8:45 - Couple of substantial hills in this mile.  About half way through we met up with the 5k runners.  Seemingly all 3,500 of them.

The last .2 was all downhill, and with thoughts of coming in under 54 minutes I ran it pretty hard, 7:21 per mile pace.  Finishing at 53:19, 8:35/mile.

875/1891 overall
624/997 male
76/143 age group

So I ran a 10k. Went 3-4 minutes faster than I thought possible.  Broke a 2-1/2 year old 10k PB by exactly 2 minutes*.  Never really hurt throughout the race.  Makes me wonder what I could have done If I had pushed a little more.

I hadn't planned on running the Jingle Bell 10k in Madison in a couple of weeks, but I may have been bit by the racing bug so perhaps I will.  It's not exactly a PR type of course and time of year, but it was the site of my first ever endurance event, the 10k back in 2007.  1 hour and 14 minutes of frozen fun back then, hopefully quite a bit faster this time around.

*  a note on my 10k PR.   I just have not run a lot of them.  Even today's 8:35 effort is only two seconds ahead of my half marathon PR pace.  So big picture not that impressive, but I'm still happy with it.  We're on the right track.