Hanover/Horton, MI
29:57 (5:59/mile)
17th overall (out of 200)
3rd in age (out of 14)

        6 days after a marathon I run a 5 mile race. What was I thinking? A week after my very first marathon I ran a 10K race. At that time I thought it was silly as well. I have not run a ‘short’ race in a while, I guess.
A nice little small town holiday race which I ran 2 years ago. It is a point-to-point race between two sister cities southwest of Jackson.  It is part of a big July 4 holiday party in Hanover including parade and pie auction. Small town America at its finest.
        The race is rather straight forward, 5 simple miles along county roads. My legs were still a little sore from my marathon so I really had no idea how fast I was going to be able to go. My ‘solid’ 5 km pace is about 5:40 or so, and when my first mile was 6 flat, I was happy. The field seemed slow as I was still near the lead pack after 1 mile. I felt strong and just tried to run even, staying in my grove. Mile 2, 3, and 4 all right at 6 min pace and I still felt strong. Seeing 30 min flat was a possibility, I tried to keep even all the way through.  A good kick ensured my (what I thought was) a nice finish time.
      I rode to the race with my good friend and mentor, Brian Olsen (also the head cross country coach at JCC) and he wanted to try to break his time from 2 years past, 28:20. He managed to win the whole race just over 28 minutes. That means there were 17 people within 2 minutes of the leader. A slow but solid field.  I had to settle for 3rd in my age group as the #2 and #3 runner overall were also men age 35-39. Oh well, I still got a cool coffee cup for my efforts.
       I am running 4 races in 5 weeks, but this is the only one that is NOT a marathon. I should enjoy the easy nature of today’s race. I did do a 2 mile warm-up and 5 mile cool down, though, to make it a 12 mile day.

Bay City, MI
29:31 (5:56/mi)
9th overall (out of 381)
1st in age (out of 40)
Official Results

A new PR, and that being ~26 hours after a (sortof) 5K PR!! Not bad for a spring weekend.

Bay City is a nice little town of ~40,000 that has some quaint community events, and this race is one such event. There were in fact three different races, my 8K, a 5K run and a 5K walk. The 5K distances had many many more entrants and you can tell that many people entering them are not ‘regular’ runners. There was a definate ’small town’ feel to the event and post race festivities including cookies, and a nice coney dog served to me from a street vendor.

The race was nice, with race temp of about 30 degrees, but unlike yesterday’s race, there was a stiff wind in my face for the first half. For half of the ‘out’ of the out and back I shielded myself behind a bunch of teenage rabbits running the 5K. Again, after yesterdays tear of a run, I didn’t quite know how fast I was going to be able to run. After a 5:50 first mile, I felt pretty good. The second mile was 6:00 exactly as was miles 3 and 4. A little bit of a pickup at the end to guarantee a sub 30:00 time and that adds up to another PR.

So in my marathon training I really don’t much like ’speed’ workouts (which in marathon circles means tempo runs and 1-mile repeats) so I treat these ’shorter’ races as workouts. What is great about that is I get a t-shirt and the great feeling that comes after a race. Two PR’s in two consecutive days means that my training is going OK. Again, I never train for these races other than doing 50-60 miles a week. I love my hobby.

1Jan07
30:33 (6:07/ mile pace)
4th overall (out of 281)
2nd in age group (out of 39)
Official Results

What a perfect day for a race! Well, as perfect as you could want for New Years Day I guess. Temps in the low 30’s with a stiff 10-15 mph wind. The course was laid out such that we headed into the wind mostly during the first half of the race and finished with it at our back.

This was the third race I did with my nephew, but this time I let him run on his own, without me whipping him all along. He did pretty good finishing 52nd overall. I had not run competitvely for a while so i was pumped up. A 6:07 pace is fine for this distance. I have recently started my official training for the Boston marathon though. It might sound like I am making excuses, not running as fast as I could, I know. Really, I am training to improve my marathon time, not doing nearly enough speed work to do well on 5K’s and the like. I am doing a 5K in a couple of weeks and will shoot for a sub 18 time, but I have reasonable expectations for that.

Instead of a t-shirt (which I have plenty of) this race gave out 16 oz beer glasses, filled with one free beer afterward. That was cool, and for the first time I actually got a post race massage. They are common in big races, but the lines are always long. We were waiting for the awards so i decided to put my name down and hope I got lucky. I did!

One other thing, the people in Wisconsin are slow compared to people in Michigan. If I ran a race with 281 finishers in Michigan (comparable distance) at the pace I did this race, my place would have been in the low teens, not 4th. This is the third race I have run in Wisconsin in ‘the modern era’ and they have all had similair stories. I need to run in Wisconsin more often, it makes me feel good
A great way to start the new year, for sure.

31:47 (6:21 pace)
18th overall (out of 183 finishers) 
3rd in age group (out of 12)

Not my best effort, for sure. The day was humid as could be, but the temperature was only in the high 60’s. According to everyone I talked to, it was a generally ’slow’ day for a race.
If the mile markers can be trusted, I ran my first in 5:45, and my second in 6:15. I am guessing the mile markers were NOT accurate because my pace did not change THAT much, although I know I slowed down.
I am getting the feeling of being raced-out. There is a 10K road race in 10 days that I was thinking of entering, but I think I have to bail. My 12 day family vacation to Maine sortof threw off my training schedule, and like my other races, I didn’t ‘get up’ for this one. I sortof need to concentrate, either go whole hog as a marathon runner, or spend a little more time focusing on the short distances. I am allready registered for the half marathon in late August, the Detroit marathon in late October, and am planning on Boston 2007. I guess that part of the calculation is allready made for me

31:44
15/190 Overall
3/? Age

The day was absolutely perfect for a run. About 50 degrees, no wind, and blue sky. I started out solid (first mile at 5:50) but then slowed down. I could feel the 15 miles I put on two days ago as the race went on.

As my first marathon is mere weeks away, I cannot ‘give up’ any training days for races, so I did my long run of the week on thursday, and the race was my ‘tempo’ run of the week. I will do the same for the next two races for the same reason. Those are both 5Ks.

When I put my time for the race into the cool distance calculator, I still get a sub 3:10 marathon, so I am still on pace. Focus focus focus…