Rothman and end-of-season thoughts

Early this morning I raced my last race of this cycle, the Rothman 8k. It was a chilly morning with a slight breeze going out along the river and I was hoping to be dragged out to a fast time. I ended up 6th in a 24:20 PR, so it was definitely a successful day. The race was tactical for a road race, with the lead pack, which I was tucked in to, going out in a relatively slow 4:52.

The next two miles were slightly downhill as we went out along the Schuylkill. At three miles we were around 14:25, and the pack was still altogether. I still felt pretty good at this point and thought I was prepared for a surge from the four Africans leading the pack. At the turnaround just after 3 miles, they put the hammer down and left me and another guy in the dust, with a NYAC guy holding on for a little bit. He fell off and the I outran the guy I was with to try and get up to the NYAC guy. I ended up gaining some time on him in the last mile but he had too much of a gap on me and I got 6th by a measly 4 seconds. The top Africans ran away from us in the last 3k, putting 30 seconds on me. 

Now that I'm done my season and made a successful entry into the road racing scene, I'll take a little bit of downtime the week of Thanksgiving and then get back into serious training for the winter months. I haven't decided if I'll race any indoor meets, but if I do I won't try and run really well in them, instead just using them to keep my racing and tactical senses relatively sharp while training through. I'm excited for the training this winter, because this cycle really opened my eyes to what a good, solid strength base can do for my track times. The only thing that I changed from last year to this year was training for the half marathon in the summer, and I ran 40 seconds faster in the 8k this year, so I'm pumped to find out what this will do for my 5k/10k times. 

As far as this season goes, it has definitely been a good one. I PR'd twice in the 8k (last weekend and this weekend), ran a great half marathon debut and won NIRCA Nationals. It doesn't seem like I ran that many races, but I raced 6 times, which is only one less than had I run a regular XC season, and that's with a half marathon in there. I have but one complaint...I didn't have a chance to make NCAA Nationals, and I would've had a great shot this year. So it goes. 

NIRCA Nationals Recap

The team got back late last night from Charlotte so I decided to wait and reflect a little before putting my thoughts in print. Some pros of the race:

1) The obvious pro is that I won the race. It was a relatively easy win, both because I felt great and the competition was not a top-heavy as I thought it might have been. I'm glad I didn't have to put forth a complete effort to win, since I have an even bigger race next weekend that certainly will require a 100% effort.

2) The course and weather were awesome. McAlpine Creek park's XC course is perfect for fast times, as it is basically a cinder trail with a small hill but otherwise totally flat. The weather was also perfect, mid 50s and sunny with no wind.

The start

The finish

3) The organization of the race was top-notch. From the way the course was set up and marked, to the way the start and finish were handled to the way the results/check-in areas were done was all very professional and definitely better than what I expected based on how Regionals was done. I was definitely impressed with that and had a good experience at my only NIRCA race of the year.

Now for the cons:

1) As a team we didn't run quite as well as we were hoping for. We got 4th, after tying with Minnesota and squeaking ahead in the tiebreaker. We thought we would be able to get top 3 but some guys on the team didn't run quite what they wanted, and the whole race was a lot deeper than we expected. 

2) I doubt the course is accurate. The times were all extremely (unbelievably) fast, and there was another starting line set about 200m back from where we started. I'm not sure if that was supposed to be where started, and they just moved us up to fit more people on the start, but I do think the course was short. I don't think this is a big problem, since cross country is all about place and not times, but on a day and course like that it would have been nice to have run a fast time for eight thousand meters.

EDIT: The course director replied to an inquisitory email regarding this course and confirmed my suspicions. She said the course was about 150-200m short, so I will adjust my time by the 35 seconds it took me to cover the real start line to the fake start line at what felt like race pace. 

Like I said up top, I am really happy with the race. It went about as well as possible, except it would have been nice to know it was an 8k and to run a legit 8k PR, but still, the win was the thing I was after. 

Obligatory Pre-NIRCA Nationals Post

Tomorrow morning the club team leaves for Charlotte, dark and early. It's at least a 9 hour drive so we'll have plenty of time to think about the race. As for me, here are my preliminary thoughts:

- I am in it to win it. With that in mind, I'm going to try and run the smartest race. For me, that means a sit-and-kick type of race where I hide in the pack, cover any moves, and kick only when I know I can hold it all the way to the line. The race will probably go out fast since there are so many people (almost 600!) and that means I'll probably have to go out of my comfort zone for the first mile, but that's just how cross country races go. Just one of the reasons I like track more. 

- I would like to run a fast time, but obviously the win is more important. The course is supposed to be super fast, with a packed gravelly surface and very flat, and it's supposed to be good weather so if the competition is fast I will hopefully be pulled to an 8k pr (current PR = 25:00). 

- Speaking of competition: I have no idea what kind of competition will show up on race day, but the current favorite is a guy who's reliable 8k pr is 25:37 on the roads (he has a 24:33 pr from XC but that course is known to be short) and a 15:07 track 5k. Given these credentials, I'm not expecting a huge challenge but I'm definitely not discounting the possibility of other guys like myself coming out of the woodwork.  

All in all I am excited for this race. Training has been going well and I think I'm pretty well tuned to race well over this distance. I do wish I had a better handle on the competition but we'll see how it all shakes out come Saturday at 11 am. 

Racing Season Has Begun!

Today was the first race in a string of races over the next few weekends. The race today was a cross country 5k (or at least a distance close to 5k - it may have been a little long, the jury is still out on that) over rolling hills and soft grass in 15:20. I won by a second and it was definitely a race effort, but in retrospect if I had to go a little harder I probably could have. I didn't feel "bouncy" so I know I still have some room to improve in racing. Since this race kicks off my racing season in earnest I'll start taking the in-between training really easy, backing off both mileage and intensity, so I can give a maximum effort when it counts. This was also my first race in a Delaware Running Company uniform which I will also be donning in Philly in 2 weekends.

Next weekend is the NIRCA national championship in Charlotte. This promises to be a good race up front and I will definitely be trying for the win. Who knows who will come out of the woodwork to try and win the individual race, so it promises to be an exciting time. UD Club team also has a good shot at winning the team race, coming off a good win over UVA at the regional meet last weekend. A pleasant surprise we had this week was that UD is giving us a sweet coach bus down to Charlotte, which is about a million times better than us driving ourselves for 9 hours.

Two weekends from now is the Rothman 8k in Philly, which is my other target race after NIRCA. The course is super fast and a road race, so hopefully the weather cooperates and it isn't painfully cold. If everything lines up it will be a blazing fast race. I'm in the elite field so I hope I can hang on to the leaders and get pulled to a really fast time. Depending on how I feel in the week after that I might either take a break or keep training for another race.

A third race I could do is an early-season indoor 5k at CNU. It'll be 2 weeks after Rothman and in the past has drawn a lot of good guys from places like W&M looking for an early-season qualifier running off of cross country fitness. If that seems like a promising choice then I might do that, otherwise it's curtains for the season and looking forward to being back on the track.