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.