Chris - 6.2

This is the second big 10k race that I've done. I didn't get enough sleep on Friday night and only about 7 on Saturday night, so I might've been a tad sleep deprived the day of the race. Race started at 8am so I had to get up about 6am. We had to park down from The Old Spaghetti Factory and then ride a bus across the river to the start at the Adidas Headquarters. Here's a map of the course that I made on mapmyrun. It's a pretty fast route that we took. My bus got there around 7:40 so I went for a warmup run and stretched out a bunch. I decided to go stand in the huge line for the bathrooms even though I didn't have to go very bad (ritual), but then I saw a girl I went to college with so I went to talk with her instead.

Considering how many people were there I thought I was fairly close to the starting line, but when we took off down the hill after the gun, I got held up behind a bunch of people and had to move to the outside to speed past them. Going downhill the first mile was pretty fun, I was moving pretty good! We evened out after that and I ran with pretty much the same group almost the whole race. After the downhill there was this little uphill part and this guy up ahead of me goes "woo-hoo a hill!". He sped up in his excitement, but must've been out of his league because shortly after that he slowed down a bunch and I passed him. I settled into a pretty good pace, I felt like I was pushing myself hard, but not to the point where I would expend all of my energy too quickly. I always forget this, but around mile 3 I was thinking, "man I'm kicking my ass and there's still more than half the race left". My hope before the race was to hit the 5 mile marker and start kicking it in from there, but when I passed it all I could think of was somehow surviving enough to keep my pace and still have enough to leg it out after the 6 miler marker. After the 5 mile marker 2 or 3 people came up slowly and passed me (must've been more seasoned racers that were better at pacing themselves and leaving enough for a strong finish). I knew the last 10k I did I ran the last .2 in about 1:10, so I glanced at my watch after I passed the 6 mile marker and knew I had to have an unbelievable kick to beat 41. I gave it all I had. I was pushing and lengthing my stride as best as I could, to the point where I could hardly sprint at the very end. Crossed the line at 41:16! Good for 90th place out of 2025, and 10th in my age group. I have all of my mile splits down below. I was disappointed that I didn't get my goal of breaking 41, but satisfied that I beat my old PR by 19 seconds.

After crossing the line and trying not to collapse while sucking some serious air, I heard the PA guy say that we should pronounce it "ah-dee-dahs" and not "uh-dee-duhs" since that's apparently how they pronounce it in Germany. I went by myself to the race so I just hung around and drank some electrolyte water and had a free Jamba Juice thing and got my free Widmer beer while people watching and stretching. After I got my beer I finally saw someone I knew so I went and sat with them while the guy ate his free food, and then we left.

mile 1 - 5:48
mile 2 - 6:43
mile 3 - 6:46
mile 4 - 6:56
mile 5 - 6:49
mile 6 - 6:58
last .2 - 1:14