Country Roads 10K Race Report
After being at home all of last weekend, I needed to roam a little bit this weekend. So what better way was there to be able to do that then to combine some good country music and a race!
My good friend, Rodney Hayden, was playing at Lucy's on the Square in San Marcos (a place that I'm told doesn't have a lot of country acts) on Friday night and the San Marcos Runners Club-produced Country Roads 10K was on Saturday morning. And that's where the truck ended up heading Friday night.
The Country Roads 10K has been going on since 2004 and I was there for its first running. I didn't realize it until just a few minutes ago that I set a PR there with a time of 1:04:02. (The following weekend on a business trip to the Philadelphia area, I set PR's in New Jersey at the 10K distance on a Saturday morning and in Ohio at the half marathon distance on Sunday morning.)
I made a return trip the following year (2005) and posted the following splits on a hot, humid day:
Mile 1 - 9:25.80
Mile 2 - 10:09.43 (19:35.23)
Mile 3 - 10:22.00 (29:57.23)
Mile 4 - 10:18.16 (40:15.39) ... I'm thinking, "To be holding at 10 minutes a mile on a humid morning is OK."
Mile 5 - 11:31.44 (51:46.83) ... Yeah, right! Spoke to soon.
Mile 6 - 11:01.59 (1:02:48.42)
Last .2 - 1:52.63 (1:04:41.05)
After seeing Rodney perform last night, I didn't get to sleep until about 1:30 a.m. at the Super 8 (no Marriotts in San Marcos ... yet, I'm sure). Since I was staying not more than a couple of miles from the race site - just off Highway 12 outside of town, I didn't leave the hotel until about 7:10 a.m. (That is until I had to twist and turn the pickup truck since I was almost blocked in by a late-night arriving hotel guest. I was a bit perturbed.)
When I got to the race location, who did I see? Karen and Tim Bowler from Houston. It is always good to see familiar faces at an out-of-town race. They're long time friends (from back to the RTW days of 2003 even) and just great overall people. Karen has been working her way back from some health issues.
I've always liked this race. It is a little challenging. Especially the first three miles where you do two small loops of some hilly terrain. There are some slight inclines in miles 5 and 6 and they cause some issues when the day is getting a little warm.
It was fairly cool this morning, but I don't believe that it was the low 60s that the guy on the public address system was surmising that it was. [I stand corrected. Weatherunderground.com said that it was 62.4 degrees at the start. By the time I finished though, it had risen to between 71.4 and 72.6, and I could tell.]
The end result? I posted a time of 1:02:51. I'm pleased. I still would prefer to be posting times of 58, 59, 60 or 61, but the decent half marathon two weeks ago and this effort are two that I'm pretty much OK with.
Mile 1 -- 9:31.85
Mile 2 -- 9:58.47 (19:30.32)
Mile 3 -- 10:10.87 (29:41.19)
Mile 4 -- 9:50.82 (39:32.01)
Mile 5 -- 10:44.91 (50:16.92)
Mile 6 -- 10:45.40 (1:01:02.32)
Last .2 -- 1:52.84 (1:02:55.16)
When I crossed the finish line and hit my watch, it didn't stop. It took another couple of seconds to get it stopped. I checked what the individual working the finish line wrote down and she had "62:51". That's what I'm going with. So that make the final two tenths of a mile as 1:48.84 - which means I was clipping the slighly downhill section in a 9-minute per mile pace.
After visiting at length with San Marcos Daily Record running columnist Moe Johnson (and who is also the race director of the ARA-Moe's Better Half Marathon), I got back to the hotel, showered and headed north to Austin to have lunch with a friend of mine.
I had won a door prize even -- two tacos from one of the race sponsors in San Marcos. I gave it to Moe. :)
My good friend, Rodney Hayden, was playing at Lucy's on the Square in San Marcos (a place that I'm told doesn't have a lot of country acts) on Friday night and the San Marcos Runners Club-produced Country Roads 10K was on Saturday morning. And that's where the truck ended up heading Friday night.
The Country Roads 10K has been going on since 2004 and I was there for its first running. I didn't realize it until just a few minutes ago that I set a PR there with a time of 1:04:02. (The following weekend on a business trip to the Philadelphia area, I set PR's in New Jersey at the 10K distance on a Saturday morning and in Ohio at the half marathon distance on Sunday morning.)
I made a return trip the following year (2005) and posted the following splits on a hot, humid day:
Mile 1 - 9:25.80
Mile 2 - 10:09.43 (19:35.23)
Mile 3 - 10:22.00 (29:57.23)
Mile 4 - 10:18.16 (40:15.39) ... I'm thinking, "To be holding at 10 minutes a mile on a humid morning is OK."
Mile 5 - 11:31.44 (51:46.83) ... Yeah, right! Spoke to soon.
Mile 6 - 11:01.59 (1:02:48.42)
Last .2 - 1:52.63 (1:04:41.05)
After seeing Rodney perform last night, I didn't get to sleep until about 1:30 a.m. at the Super 8 (no Marriotts in San Marcos ... yet, I'm sure). Since I was staying not more than a couple of miles from the race site - just off Highway 12 outside of town, I didn't leave the hotel until about 7:10 a.m. (That is until I had to twist and turn the pickup truck since I was almost blocked in by a late-night arriving hotel guest. I was a bit perturbed.)
When I got to the race location, who did I see? Karen and Tim Bowler from Houston. It is always good to see familiar faces at an out-of-town race. They're long time friends (from back to the RTW days of 2003 even) and just great overall people. Karen has been working her way back from some health issues.
I've always liked this race. It is a little challenging. Especially the first three miles where you do two small loops of some hilly terrain. There are some slight inclines in miles 5 and 6 and they cause some issues when the day is getting a little warm.
It was fairly cool this morning, but I don't believe that it was the low 60s that the guy on the public address system was surmising that it was. [I stand corrected. Weatherunderground.com said that it was 62.4 degrees at the start. By the time I finished though, it had risen to between 71.4 and 72.6, and I could tell.]
The end result? I posted a time of 1:02:51. I'm pleased. I still would prefer to be posting times of 58, 59, 60 or 61, but the decent half marathon two weeks ago and this effort are two that I'm pretty much OK with.
Mile 1 -- 9:31.85
Mile 2 -- 9:58.47 (19:30.32)
Mile 3 -- 10:10.87 (29:41.19)
Mile 4 -- 9:50.82 (39:32.01)
Mile 5 -- 10:44.91 (50:16.92)
Mile 6 -- 10:45.40 (1:01:02.32)
Last .2 -- 1:52.84 (1:02:55.16)
When I crossed the finish line and hit my watch, it didn't stop. It took another couple of seconds to get it stopped. I checked what the individual working the finish line wrote down and she had "62:51". That's what I'm going with. So that make the final two tenths of a mile as 1:48.84 - which means I was clipping the slighly downhill section in a 9-minute per mile pace.
After visiting at length with San Marcos Daily Record running columnist Moe Johnson (and who is also the race director of the ARA-Moe's Better Half Marathon), I got back to the hotel, showered and headed north to Austin to have lunch with a friend of mine.
I had won a door prize even -- two tacos from one of the race sponsors in San Marcos. I gave it to Moe. :)
posted by WalkSports.com | 7:14 PM
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