Zak (the Green Lake Track Club coach) informed me that he would also be running in the Firecracker 5000 and asked if I wanted to join him in warm-up drills and run the first mile together. I jumped at the opportunity, knowing that he would do a good job holding me back at the start so that I could avoid my recurring bad habit of going out too fast. The race start/finish was located at Memorial Stadium and I arrived at 11:00 p.m. to pick up my race bib and chip timer. Zak arrived about 15 minutes later and we began our warm-up with an easy loop along part of the course around the Seattle Center. With about 10 minutes remaining, we headed to the starting line and I ran a couple of stride drills along the length of the Memorial Stadium field until I realized I was managing to catch every astroturf pebble in my shoes. One minute to go and the announcer began the final countdown. I blocked out the noise around me, set my watch, and calmly recited a simple mantra I learned from Erin of Jasyoga which helped clear my pre-race jitters and reset my mental focus (Breathe in: "I am", Breathe out: "Here now").
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| Start of the 2014 Firecracker5000 5k! |
The race started and I immediately moved into position beside Zak. My body screamed at me to pick up the pace as about 60 - 70 runners flew ahead of us, but Zak assured me we were on a solid 5:45 pace and that we would be seeing many of those runners again "real soon". Trusting his instinct and advice, I settled into the pace and realized how familiar the situation felt and how easily I could mistake the moment for just another one of our weekly tempo workout runs. Sure enough, we started catching up with a lot of runners who had clearly started out too fast and my watch alerted me that I had just cleared the first mile in a solid split of 5:46.
At that point, Zak broke away and sped up his pace while I felt just strong enough to maintain it. The second mile brought the first major hill and it hurt. I was not joking when I said this course was tougher than the Fremont 5k. Downtown Seattle can be an unforgivable bi-...g pain. Maybe those pathetic mortal endeavors of barbecues and watching fireworks might not have been such a bad idea after all... If I had run the first mile any faster I probably would have crashed towards the end of the second mile. Instead, I was able to hold on and clear the second mile split in 6:05.
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| Section of the race course along the Seattle Center. The entire course was surprisingly well lit. |
The third mile was just as tough. The section along 1st Ave consisted of a half mile of pure joy uphill. Fantastic. I was about to hit the 2.4 mile mark when my journey up Mt. Everest 1st Ave was interrupted by a group of college students driving by in the adjacent lane which was still open to traffic. A young woman leaned out the window as they passed and yelled "YA! you go guy with the short shorts!" Now, hold on here a second ladies and gentlemen. You don't even understand how badly I wanted to respond with something like "Am I rocking these short shorts or what?!" or "They should probably put me on the cover of the next Runner's World!" or even "Excuse me but the full politically correct term is Aerodynamic Short Shorts (ASS)!". However, with my lungs busy inhaling sweet precious life and exhaling death and misery plus the fact that they probably wouldn't have appreciated the magazine or bodonk reference, I only managed a polite smile and wave. With about a quarter mile left to go, I switched gears into 400-meter repeat mode and flew into memorial stadium and across the finish line with my first sub-6:00 average pace and an official time of 18:33 (5:59/mile) for a new 5k PR. Double score!
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| This is about all the external happiness I was able to convey that late at night. Trust me, I was a lot happier than I look. Photo credit thanks to Brenda Alvarez. |
At the finish area, I met back up with Zak and thanked him for pacing me the first mile. I was also able to catch up with Brenda and Nick (two more Monday Night Runners) who also had good races!
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| Hanging out with Monday Night Run friends after the race! Photo credit thanks to Brenda Alvarez. |
Before heading out, I managed to hear that brother and sister Brian and Andrea Masterson were the winners of the overall Men and Women divisions. I was also able to catch a glimpse of this year's costume winners.
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| FireCracker5000 2014 costume winners. 'Murica! Photo credit thanks to official Firecracker5000 website. |
Post race thoughts/comments:
1. Thanks again Zak for pacing me to a new 5k PR!
2. I am still building up my mileage with the Green Lake Track Club. It is so awesome to see the improvement I have been feeling reflected in actual race performance. It has delivered a confidence boost and at the same time has helped reassure me that the training and miles I am putting in each week is working. With that said, staying healthy is the highest priority for me. No amount of improvement is worth the risk of seriously injuring myself and I have already had to adjust and even skip a number of runs over these past couple weeks after listening to my body.
3. We have moved on to long interval speed work phase with the GLTC. Our next workout will consist of 2x 400-800-1200 repeats. I have never actually incorporated long interval distances into my training before so I am looking forward to (surviving) this learning experience.
3. The next race on my schedule is the Seafair 5k on 7/26/2014.
4. I highly recommend trying out this race. Just be prepared for an erratic sleep schedule throughout the rest of your Fourth of July weekend.
4. I highly recommend trying out this race. Just be prepared for an erratic sleep schedule throughout the rest of your Fourth of July weekend.
