New PR! -- Mardi Gras Beach Run Race Report
The clock time was 58:40! My watch was 58:29.78! (Official results haven't been posted online yet, as of 1 p.m. Saturday.) Under an hour at the 10K distance for the first time ever!
The conditions were much the same as last year when the event -- the Mardi Gras Beach Run --was on Valentine's Day Saturday morning and I posted a 1:04:19.6! It was in the lower-to-mid 40s with some wind that was coming off of the Gulf of Mexico. (Those of you familiar with Galveston, we started at Stewart Beach right by Brodie's Beach Hut.)
Other than slipping under an hour, this scored -- using something similar to an age-grading system that I use from the Plano Pacers site -- as my best run ever to date!
I had great (and unexpected) help though. A co-worker and friend of Power In Motion (PIM) Fitness coach Megan Clark-Dillingham, Laura Babcock, also a fellow Houston Strider, had passed me somewhere in the beginning of mile 3. I remembered that she did the swimming portion of the half ironman relay that Megan had participated in back in October in Conroe.
After the turnaround at mile 2.5, I figured that it was definitely her and worked to catch up with her near the mile 3 mark. At that point, I was at 29:20.80 (the exact pace I needed to slip under an hour). The first three miles were 9:42.30, 9:36.30 and 10:02.20 (which included the water stop and my typical slide in mile 3).
But, running with Laura, mile 4 was 8:55.59 and mile 5 was 9:16.26, which I knew gave me enough cushion to almost guarantee (short of a face plant) an under one hour finish.
At about mile 5 and a half, Laura broke free a little bit and probably on any other day, I might have taken a quick walk break; however, I sucked it up and churned off the last 1.2 miles in 10:57.13 (which equated to a 9:02 pace)!
I didn't even say, "Hi, Karen!," to race photographer (and friend) Karen Thibodeaux heading down the stretch since I wanted to ensure that I cracked an hour on the clock!
More later! (Off to go shower and head to our church to referee some Upward Basketball games!)
The conditions were much the same as last year when the event -- the Mardi Gras Beach Run --was on Valentine's Day Saturday morning and I posted a 1:04:19.6! It was in the lower-to-mid 40s with some wind that was coming off of the Gulf of Mexico. (Those of you familiar with Galveston, we started at Stewart Beach right by Brodie's Beach Hut.)
Other than slipping under an hour, this scored -- using something similar to an age-grading system that I use from the Plano Pacers site -- as my best run ever to date!
I had great (and unexpected) help though. A co-worker and friend of Power In Motion (PIM) Fitness coach Megan Clark-Dillingham, Laura Babcock, also a fellow Houston Strider, had passed me somewhere in the beginning of mile 3. I remembered that she did the swimming portion of the half ironman relay that Megan had participated in back in October in Conroe.
After the turnaround at mile 2.5, I figured that it was definitely her and worked to catch up with her near the mile 3 mark. At that point, I was at 29:20.80 (the exact pace I needed to slip under an hour). The first three miles were 9:42.30, 9:36.30 and 10:02.20 (which included the water stop and my typical slide in mile 3).
But, running with Laura, mile 4 was 8:55.59 and mile 5 was 9:16.26, which I knew gave me enough cushion to almost guarantee (short of a face plant) an under one hour finish.
At about mile 5 and a half, Laura broke free a little bit and probably on any other day, I might have taken a quick walk break; however, I sucked it up and churned off the last 1.2 miles in 10:57.13 (which equated to a 9:02 pace)!
I didn't even say, "Hi, Karen!," to race photographer (and friend) Karen Thibodeaux heading down the stretch since I wanted to ensure that I cracked an hour on the clock!
More later! (Off to go shower and head to our church to referee some Upward Basketball games!)
posted by WalkSports.com | 1:26 PM
4 Comments:
CONGRATS on your PR! That's awesome! I really wish I had been running the race today myself, but with my foot injury from the half I'm stuck on the sidelines. CONGRATS though and way to go!
awesome job! I'm just so impressed you were able to string together such good times, even with the "slide" at mile 3! WTG!
-c
TxSkatemom
http://hooha.org/skatemom
Congrats on your run! A sub-1 hour 10K has been my goal for a while now. Closest I've gotten is 1:03 at the Rodeo Run a year ago. I probably won't even do that well this year. I need to start training for the distance again! :)
Not to take away from your accomplishment, but I hope the 10K course was accurate -- I did the Mardi Gras 5K on Saturday, and I went through mile 1 in 11:00 and mile 2 at 19:00. Finished in 29:30. My guess is that the turnaround point wasn't correctly placed, and I think the 5K was actually more like 2.9 miles. Hopefully they didn't make the same mistake with the 10K.
The website says the course was a short one. I was surprised myself because my pace was a lot better than normal until I heard someone said that it was at least 1/4 of a mile short.
Great job everyone!
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