Location: Charlotte, NC
Date: December 11, 2010
Placing: 38th - 45+
Format: 10k Off-Road Running Race
My Race Photos
Results: Click Here
Check the run on Garmin by clicking HERE
I'll just start by saying that this race was so good that I almost wish it had happened smack dab in the middle of my season rather than when I was just taking the legs for their first few test drives. Not that I would have placed so much better that this would have been a heroic tale...I mean this race was chock full of reasons for me NOT to place:
1. It was the national championships. If you were at this race, you are pretty much a 40+-year-old mutant of a runner.
2. It was a relatively short race for me. I don't hold a candle to 'sprinter' guys.
3. I'm just starting my season so although it was a 'big' event, I planned on it being a fun adventure with my Greenville Track Club teammates.
It was also my first cross-country (off-road) race ever. However, I didn't take this as something that would effect my time or placing much (although a good number of my teammates seemed to think that we were likely to lose a few seconds over the course due to 'slippage'). For these reasons, I set a hard - but deliverable - goal for myself. No expectations of greatness here. My expectation was to run around a 35:30; a little over twice my 5k time from last week. But there were 2 things I had not counted on that took me by surprise. And it was these 2 things that turned a good race south...
You ever hear that expression "trying to fit a square peg in a round hole"? Well, that was surprise number one. The original field estimate of 250 runners came closer to 400 on race day. Sure, I've done races with 25,000 people before but in those events you are usually seeded into corrals and the road is pretty wide and if someone bumps you a bit, you don't have to worry about face-planting into a tree. Even on paper, most engineers would wince. You see, all 400 of us lined up in large, open field on a single start line that was about 100 meters wide. We stood there - in our assigned team start box - about 2 or 3 rows deep. At the sound of the pistol, we had about 150 meters to squeeze down to the width of about a single car lane. You do the math. Sounds like a magic trick, doesn't it. I'm told that this is how cross-country races are run. At first I thought it was some kind of joke. Who knew?
The gun went off and it must have been quite a sight. Picture the Battle of Stirling from Braveheart..."They may take our lives, but they will never take our FREEDOM!". Majestically and with radiating vigor we took off crossing the field. Now cross that with a typical scene this time of year. Every last one of us trying to be the first one through the doors of WalMart the morning after Thanksgiving. "BAAAAAAAHHHHH". Sorry...still having flashbacks. Oh, the horror. I was about two-thirds of the way to the dirt path when I heard a quick smathering of curse words and I glanced over for only a fraction of an instant (so as not to crash myself) and what I saw in that moment looked like a group of Muppets flying through the air. My teammate Joe Hammond who was still just two steps ahead of me glanced back and shined me a look like he was running for his life.
Look closely. I'm sandwiched right in the middle at mile 1 and this was after the trail opened up a bit!
Through the grace of God, I somehow made it. After about 3 seconds of celebrating, I snapped back to reality and was astonished that hardly a single person looked strained running their first mile in the low to mid 5-minute range. In most 10k's that don't include professional runners, I would already be in the top 20 runners at this pace. Wow. For the first couple of minutes it was like my senses were being bashed in. All I could do was think about someone running into the back of me with my sideways 'cerebral palsey' stride. But then it suddenly all came back to me. I had done this for 25 years of my life. This was bike racing. I quickly remembered how to relax in a pack and take advantage of holes between athletes. That was the last time I worried about the volume of runners because I suddenly had bigger fish to fry.
As soon as my brain caught up to my situation, I thought "Holy Cow, it feels like we are running a 5-minute mile". I glanced at my Garmin and expected to see 160 heartrate. Instead, what I saw was 150 AND I felt pegged. Not good. Not good at all. I immediately tried to resist the thought that today was going to be one of those "asthma" days. It didn't matter how much I resisted - my body said, "sorry, Chris". I've termed them "asthma" days because I don't know what else to call them. It is likely to assume that they are somehow based on my asthma because that's about the only logical explanation. As I've written before it means that my maximum heartrate is slashed by 10 or 15 beats (which is huge) and the relative effort level follows with it. To put it in perspective...I raced 3.1 miles last week with the following average heartrates each mile: 150, 154, 157. I maxed out at 163 at the finish. My first mile was a 5:30 and it hardly felt like I was working. Today, my first mile was 5:39 at an average heartrate of 151 and it felt like I was going to die.
I look a lot more strained than the other runners at the halfway point. Moments later, my teammate Joe Hammond (left)...left.
Oddly enough, my plan had me running the first 2 miles at a 151 heartrate - and that's where I was. The problem was that I could not even imagine kicking it higher at miles 3 and 5. Even if I could've done something about it by backing down...I really couldn't. You see, at mile marker 1 there were probably 30 people within a 10-foot radius of me and we were all hauling ass. If I had backed off for an instant, I chanced getting tripped and trampled. It was like we were all being sucked along in a current. Amazingly at this point, I heard my buddy Joe say something to me. We were still practically side by side. We ended up being good pacers for each other right up until just before the halfway point.
There is no mistaking how much this hurt. The "pain face" says it all.
The group finally thinned for me around the 2-mile mark. This was the point at which I was supposed to kick it up a notch. Instead, the pain was as hard as any race I'd felt in a long time and my heartrate was still sitting between 150 and 152. Pushing through pain is one of the things that makes me a better endurance athlete in the first place. At least that's what I kept telling myself in order to continue. That and the fact that this was a club championships and I didn't want to let my teammates down. At mile 3, I could no longer hang on to Joe's pace. He seemed to be picking it up when in actuality, I had passed my limit and was slowing down.
It was all I could do at mile 5 to look down at my feet and pray for the finish line.
I gave everything I had to stay with a couple of runners that were near me. My last quarter-mile felt like a jog but I was thrilled to be near the end. I was pretty much alone as I hit the last 200 meters until I heard heavy footsteps behind me. I was still about 20 seconds or more from the finish so I bucked it up and put a last ditch effort in. Just enough to keep ahead of whoever was trying to pass me. The jerk was persistent ;-) I kicked it up another notch...and another. Son of a bitch! We were at an all out sprint for nearly 200 meters when I finally had absolutely zero left. Scratch that - I had negative zero left if that was possible. He passed me just before the line and I thought to myself as I began to pass out "man, if you had that much left why the hell didn't you use it out on the course?" Turns out he was in a younger age group anyway.
No lie - the longest sprint I may have ever done on one of the hardest days I've had in a long time. Don't ask what I was thinking because after 30 years, I rarely think - I just do.
36:30 my Garmin read. I didn't even break a 6:00 mile the last 2 miles. My heartrate average was 152 and I was wiped out. Joe had finished in 36:08. I know that if I had been able to run my race, I think I would have pushed him to run harder as well and we both would have broken 36:00. In the 45-49 age group, I finished 38th. Although the individual honors are done in 5-year increments, the team competition is awarded in 10-year increments. This didn't help us much because all of the runners on our 40-49 team were between 45 and 49. No 'youngsters' here. It took me a good while to finally move again after crossing the line and even a cooldown was a strain. I ran mile 6 at close to the pace I intend to run the entire Boston Marathon in April
Regardless of how I ran, it was an awesome race because I haven't had that felling of 'team' in a long time. Joe, myself, Danny Murray and Bob Samms had gone up the night before the race and had a great time hanging out. It was incredibly interesting for me - a guy who grew up bike racing - to hear stories from guys who had been competitve runners their whole lives. Great stories from some fast guys who used to be real fast.
I mentioned at the start that the photographers were awesome at this event and quite honestly, I think my face says it all. As a matter of fact, local elite runner Kevin Mosteller watched our race and cheered for us. After the race I told Kevin about my problems during the race and his response was "Yeah, when I saw you...you didn't look so good"...
Race Notes:
* Well - I actually finished writing this post several days ago and just hadn't had a chance to put it on the website. Since I wrote it, I had my monthly allergy shot. After telling my pulmonologist about my recent problems (which have persisted after the race), she instantly asked me if I had a live Christmas tree in the house. Why yes I did. I put it up right after the Paris Mountain 5k. Duh! Live tree in the house = asthma no-no. Hopefully that clears things up! I'm still leaving it up till Christmas...what's a few more days of breathing a bit heavier?
* I just can't stress how impressive it is to see such incredible athletes in their 40's, 50's and beyond - including my Greenville Track Club teammates. The entire lot of them can outrun just about every 20-something that you know. Take that, Wii game...
Next Up: Mobile Half Marathon in January.
