Lawyers Have Heart 10k Race Recap

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 I finally ran faster than my previous best 10k at the Lawyers Have Heart 10k this morning!

My previous best 10k was 38:46, run on a track in 2008. I ran that race with Sarah Burns, one of my fellow Navy track/XC athletes. We ran at Towson, on a slightly drizzly spring morning, temperatures in the low 60's. We had teammates calling out our splits every 200m. I think we traded off every mile or every 5 laps and then let the engines loose on the final lap. I hadn't seen sub-39:00 since. While training on my own, I've gotten close recently--39:00 last fall at Race for the Parks 10k--but no banana, no cigar, almost doesn't count.

Since training with Capital Area Runners, I've set PRs in the 4 mile and the 1 mile. It's nice that I continued in that fashion today. I would also like to thank Bancroft McGavin Horvath & Judkins, P.C. for allowing me to race with them, covering my entry fee, and giving me a great singlet to wear.

Pre-Race:
I went climbing/camping last weekend and didn't do a long run. On Monday evening, I had a hill workout. For the rest of the week, I was feeling dizzy and a little run down (maybe because I was on my period and not hydrating very well? My weight also dropped about 5 lbs mid-week, so that probably meant I wasn't watching my nutrition and water intake very well.). I reduced the mileage (and worked more hours at work) and increased my water intake. Although weighing 5 lbs less FEELS nice, it feels better knowing I'm well hydrated and fueled.

For the day before the race, I ate:
chai tea latte, breakfast spinach and egg white wrap
steak salad, water, some ice cream
Thai ginger chicken with rice, water

Race Day:
I woke up at 6AM, had a sip of water, and Rob dropped me off at the race around 6:30. I checked my bag and did a 1.5-2 mile warm-up with some teammates followed by two strides. The starting corral was SO CROWDED! They started the corral with "elites" followed by "7:00-7:59 pace." I think they should have had a "Sub-6:00" corral and a "6:00-6:59" corral as well. I grabbed a water of Gatorade and sipped it down before we ran.

I found Karina at the start and we talked some strategy. Start off around 6:20-6:30/mi pace and cut down from there. I wasn't wearing my Garmin, so I was going off the mile markers and my trusty Timex. We stayed together for the first 3.5 miles of the race, when I decided to pick it up a little bit.

Mile 1: 6:17 (Okay, starting nice and slow...)
Mile 2: 6:35 (What? That one felt faster than the first one!)
Mile 3: 6:22 (Seriously, I thought I was going faster than this...)
Mile 4: 6:03 (Time to pick it up. Maybe that pace was a little ballsy...f*ck. Feeling good, though.)
Mile 5: 6:15 (I missed the mile marker, so this is a guess. I looked down and saw 6:18 after I had passed the water stop. I tossed some water over my head at this point.)
Mile 6.2: 7:00 (I tried to pass a man running with a dog and keep up with another man running with me. This is a 5:50/mi pace if I ran it evenly.)

Official time: 38:31

Obviously, I'm happy with the race. A PR is a PR.

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