Slow It Goes

Saturday morning I awoke and set off for Cape Coral for a decidedly humid 5K race.  Rotary Park was the setting for Florida's Senior Games, a race I have done twice before with less than stellar results.  The last time I ran this race was in 2008 on a bad hamstring.  I ran my slowest 5K ever in 25:13. 

Looking back through my running logs to research my past performances at this race I could see the slow, awful, efforts as I came back to running after a life threatening illness in 2004.  My mileage in 2005 was in the 600 mile range and 2006 wasn't much better.  2007 saw me nearly hit 1,000 miles and I ran my first Senior Games 5K that year in 22:47.

I went into this particular race knowing that breaking 24:00 would be a tough nut to crack.  The McMillan calculator showed that based on my 51 minute performance at 10K the week before, 24:33 would be the result.  I ran 24:30.

I wish I could say it was a hard run.  It wasn't.  I made it through the first mile in 7:37 feeling pretty good and thinking, maybe, just maybe I can hit 24.  But I couldn't reach down and force myself to hurt.  I slowly but surely allowed myself to fade.  The fact that the field was much smaller than previous years allowed my dawdling time to grab an age group 2nd.

As one of my blog followers pointed out, weight loss is the only thing that's going to return my speed.  10 pounds would be worth a good 90 seconds off my 5K time.  I've got a month before my next race.  I plan to keep my mileage in the 30 to 40 range and add some intensity.  I might even do some long intervals.  I want to break 23 minutes by February.  That's the goal at least.