InnerTeub

When prepping for this race, it occurred to me that I haven’t actually done an official “register and pay money and then show up on time and run with people” race since Ironman Arizona in 2008. This might explain why I spent 30 minutes wondering around trying to find where to rack my bike prior to the start.

I kid.

But seriously, I’m out of practice for this. In a previous life – one where I raced with some sort of frequency – I would have known all the details of where to be when and where to get my packet pick up and who was racing with me and blah blah blah. As it was, I found myself hitting the internet around 11pm the night before, hoping there was race day packet pick up and and wondering if I’d know anyone there.

The race started at 9, packet pick up started at 7. The start is about two miles from my house, which is actually just a nice warm up run. Well, I mean, it would have been a nice warm up run, except I drove anyway. Look, it was raining, and I was having a crisis of clothing (jacket? no jacket? etc, plus I wanted to drink my coffee on the way and didn’t have a disposable cup. Also, I’m lazy. Also, I waited until the morning of to try to figure this out and ran out of time. Also, I didn’t know how long it would…well, whatever: Race planning FAIL.)

I parked by the White House and ran to the start (about .25 miles as per Garmin. Yes, I drove to a two mile away race and parked a quarter mile away from the start I KNOW) I got there around 8, got my race number and timing chip, and then shivered for the next 58 minutes.

So, I suck at racing shorter distance: I either start way too fast and burn out or wait too long to ramp up. In terms of mental effort, I honestly feel that a half marathon is easier to pace than a 10k. Additionally, I actually don’t know how long an 8k race is; I spent the majority of the race trying to do the math and figure out how close I was to done. Seriously, this is what my thought process looked like for, oh, say, 30 minutes of the race:

“If a 5k is 3.1 miles and a 10k is 6.2, then an 8k HAS to be between those two distances…oooh, maybe’s it’s only 4 miles! I’m almost done! Wait, no, that doesn’t work out, ok, since i know it’s less than 6 but HOW MUCH less than six are we talking more than 5? That doesn’t… Wait, no, ok, so if a 5k is 3.1 miles and a 10k is 6.2 miles…”

You guys. I used to teach statistics. Competently. This is horrifying. If we ever switch to the metric system I am screwed.

ANYWAY. It turns out that 8k is almost exactly 5 miles. I finished with a 8:50ish minute/mile pace, which is funny to me because… yeah, that’s my half marathon pace. Using run/walk. Once again, I prove my utter inability to pace for a shorter race. That being said, it was a solid effort for me; I got the beginning of side stiches around the 4 mile mark, which dropped my pace considerably, and I was able to push into the final kick, but not a ton. Effort wise I think I was dead on.

So really, I just need to repeat that race 5 more times, after a 112 mile bike and 2.4 mile swim, and I’ll be an ironman! Woo!