Artie and I drove out to Akron, Ohio on Thursday afternoon. It was only about a 3 hour drive from State College, so not too bad. Artie dropped me off at the hotel and then he went and stayed with my former coach, Joe Klim, who lives in Akron now.
The next morning I did a light 5 mile run along the toe path. The toe path was surprisingly nice, a few bridges, a river, and some sort of museum that you run right next to. However, we crossed a road and had some maniac blow their horn for an overly extended amount of time. I did some hill sprints at the end and that was that.
Later on we had a course tour that was in a trolley which was pretty cute. The course appeared flat to me. I’d find out later that it was deceivingly flat. I ended up relaxing as much as possible for the remainder of the day. The race was in conjunction with the Akron Marathon so there was an expo that I was happy to check out. I usually try and stick to napping the day before a race, but sometimes it’s good to walk around a little, so the expo was perfect.
Because the 8k was in conjunction with the marathon, we had a rather early start time of 7:30 in order to work around the marathon. I still did a shake out run, definitely the earliest I’d ever run one, it was tough to get out there, but it really helps wake my body up. The weather was more humid than I had expected, but nothing compared to the races I did in August along the ocean.
So, here’s how the race unfolded. The first mile went out slower than I thought it would, around 5:08. We did have a pretty long climb going into it so that could be why. About a mile and a half in seemed to be where the pack started to break up a little. By mile two there were about 10 women, including myself, in the lead pack I think. Then, right after mile 2 it broke up even more, and was strung out pretty well into a single lane train. At this point I started to not feel so hot. I hung on somewhat, but definitely started to struggle earlier than than normal for me. We hit the largest climb of the race right before mile 3 I believe, or maybe it was just after. The hill was not so good to me. I just tried to keep my focus as Molly Huddle blasted by me at the top of it. The remainder of the race felt unusually miserable for me. We had a pretty long stretch where it was just straight and flat before turning into the baseball stadium where the race finished. I remember tripping on a dip in the road at this point and thinking that whoever was in back of me would love to see that and take advantage of my break in stride. Sure enough, I got passed soon after.
I ended up finishing in 7th. Again, I wasn’t happy and didn’t feel like myself during the race. I had some bloodwork done before CVS to see where my iron levels were and will get the results soon. I’ve never had low iron so it’ll be interesting to see what’s going on. But, running CVS just 6 days prior could take it’s toll. No excuses though, just move on!
The Tufts 10k, which is in a couple weeks, will be my next race. It’ll also be my last race of this training/racing cycle. After the 8k I’m really thinking I’m due for a break.
Filed under: national championship, road race | Tagged: 8k, road race, US Championship | Leave a comment »
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