Luke - 12

Zena Road Race 15k, 54:00, 5th place.

Had a fun little race the morning of the Super Bowl up in the farmland just northwest of Salem. A lot of the people from the group of Eugene runners I often work out with were going too, so we carpooled. I knew at least a couple people faster than me who were running so I wasn't expecting to contend for the win. The course started by going up a pretty steep hill for a mile, then had rolling uphills for the next two miles, then had two miles of pretty steep downhill, and then the last four miles or so were rolling hills. My plan was to take it somewhat easy on the first three miles and just keep Josh Gordon in sight (he's a bit faster than me and usually pretty smart about tactics), then use the downhill to reel him in a bit, then at six miles give it everything I can for the last 3.3 miles. The race pretty much went according to plan...up the first hill I did pretty well; a few people passed me near the top, so for miles 2-3 the order was the top two guys, Josh, a group of five guys, then me leading a group of three guys. During those miles the group ahead of me started to spread out, and I could tell I was stronger than the guys I was with so I pulled away from them. I picked off three of the people in the group ahead of me, so going into the downhill it was Josh still in third, a guy in white/gray about 40m back of him, a guy named Mike Blackmore (50-year-old who is faster than me, sets national age records) just behind him, and me about 40m back. Down the hill I really tried to push it, but the guys in front of me were also going strong. Blackmore was flying down the hill and by the bottom had caught up to Josh. I checked my watch when they passed a cone at about 4.5 miles and again when I passed it, and they had about 35 seconds on me at that point, so I thought I'd have a chance at catching them. I was pretty much going as fast as I could; I felt strong but not really fast. I haven't really done any fast workouts since like November so it made sense. Blackmore passed Josh and put a little distance on him, but then Josh started feeling good and passed him back and took off from me pretty well too. I felt like I was reeling in Blackmore and the guy in front of me, but if they were coming back to me they weren't coming back fast enough. The guy in front of me passed Blackmore at 8.5 or 9 miles, but really it was more Mike coming back than the other guy making a move. I passed him too with about a half a mile to go, and since we're friendly I asked him, "Can we catch this guy?" He said his calves had given out and just didn't have anything left, otherwise he would have. I gave chase but just didn't have the speed to quite get him. He finished about 9 seconds in front of me and I finished 16 seconds in front of Blackmore.

Overall I'm pretty happy with the race; I know I don't have any speed right now so I think I did the best I could with what I had. Maybe could have gained a few seconds in the second mile without it hurting my second half, but that's pretty much nothing and other than that I think I executed quite well.

I pretty much just did mileage for January in preparation for this race; now I'm going to do a bit less mileage and a lot more speedwork in order to get fit for a fast 5000 in March/April. I'm going to scout out a few track meets that will have some good competition for me. If I can I'll go down and join Steve for the Carlsbad 5000 on April 1; and if I somehow get fast enough I might be able to get into some really good meets around here in May. Good to have a plan again!

Edit 2/14: Wanted to write down my splits here...they don't mean much since the hills decided the pace, but if I ever do this race again I can compare. 6:37, 12:20 (2mi), 5:07, 5:11, 5:19, 12:07 (2mi), 5:32, 1:43 (.3mi).