Adventure Foot

This weekend I headed down to St. Louis with my friend Doug for the Delmar Loop’s Ice Carnival and their annual kick-off event, the Frozen Buns Run.  The 5K and 10K courses started right in the heart of the thriving business district at the historic Blueberry Hill nightclub and restaurant.

I entered the 5K race for this run.  It’s actually the first 5K I’ve run since I began training; the last few events I’ve entered were longer distances (10K Turkey Run, 11K Veteran’s Run).  I wanted to try a speedier run this time instead of going for distance, so I set a goal of completing the 5K in 30 minutes or less.

Well, a short story long, I didn’t do it.  We lined up at the starting point and the gun went off and I didn’t get my usual surge of excitement for an event.  I kind of put a foot into a runner with a jogging stroller in the first 10 yards of the race which irritated me.  Things didn’t get better from there.  I spent the whole first mile dodging walkers, passing people and being passed, and generally not finding my groove.

The run was part of the Ice Carnival, which featured an ice sculpture at every business!

I didn’t listen to music for this race, thinking I would feed off the energy of the crowd, but this really just created the opportunity for me to fight mentally with myself the whole time.  My internal dialog kept worrying about how much getting around the walkers had me off my time, how much my foot was still bugging me from whatever I did to hurt it last Tuesday night, how the freezing cold air was stinging my nose and throat, and how pessimistic I was about the uphill I was on.

The course was fine for the most part, and the event was generally well-run, though I’d like to see a wave start for 10K, 5K, and then walkers to avoid that congestion that had me tripping at the beginning.  I was just having a rotten day.  The uphill sections were long and tough, but it’s nothing I felt like should have stood in my way for my 30 minute goal.

I finished in a time of 33:39.  I know I’m better than that time.  As a matter of fact, I looked back at my ‘easy’ training runs in the past few weeks, and I’ve got times better than that when I wasn’t trying for speed.  Even my per-mile time for the Vet’s Day run- which was more than twice as long- was better than this performance.  It was a PR for an event (my last 5K was the Hannibal Cannibal with a time of 35 something) but certainly not a PR for that distance.

I guess what I learned from this experience is that you’re going to have off-days as a runner.  Not every event is going to go your way, and I guess that’s okay.  I can see that I need to focus on positives when I run and try to stop mentally tearing myself down.  Most days I can do that, but some days I can’t.  This Saturday I stood in my own way and my effort was just lackluster.

Don’t get the impression that I’m too discouraged though.  I’m signed up for the Catch Cupid if You Can 5K in Hannibal, and I’ll give that goal another try.  I think it’s important to acknowledge that bad days happen, and I’ll just have to adjust for my next run.  I’ll do it, I know I can.

Special congratulations to my friend Doug on his day at the Frozen Buns Run.  He was participating in only his second event ever and shaved almost 3 minutes off his Jingle Bell Run time.  That’s a huge improvement in a short amount of time.  In answer to the question at the bottom of his blog: Yeah, Doug, you’re becoming a runner.