As you know, I switched from the marathon to the half marathon in late January. I then decided that since I was fairly undertrained, I might as well go all in and add the 8k race on Saturday because, what can I say, I’m a sucker for extra medals.
This was meant to be a fun weekend and fun was had. I had a car full of Volee teammates – Sally, Lesko and Emily joined me for the (long) drive down to the beach. It took us about six hours total, which isn’t great when the drive should take about 3.5 hours. But we made it and hit up the expo to get in and get out. First up was the 8k on Saturday. I ran with a couple of my Volee teammates, Megan and Jill and we were just out to run easy. This was only my second 8k – I ran my first in 2016 the day before I broke 2 hours in the half marathon. We just trotted along and ran a 45:49, which was 9:13 pace. It felt hard, which makes sense because this was basically the first workout I have done in weeks (months?). But I was pleased with it and we vowed to run slower during the half on Sunday.
I ran with a group of four other Oiselle teammates and we ticked the miles off while chatting and supporting each other. We ran what I called “sexy pace,” meaning we just trotted along at a relatively easy pace. I expected to run this about twenty minutes off of my PR and that’s about what we did. We also ran negative splits, which is always my goal. Here were our splits, in case you are interested:
- 10:23
- 9:58
- 10:02
- 10:07
- 9:55
- 10:07
- 9:51
- 9:50
- 9:56
- 10:08
- 9:52
- 9:52
- 9:49
- Last .1: 9:12
Total time: 2:11:13
We had such a fun time running this race. It was well organized, and if you stay at the beach the logistics are easy. I woke up at 6:15, left my hotel at 7am, and the race began at 7:30. It was low stress and that is exactly how I like my race starts. This was my third time running at the beach (first my failed marathon attempt in 2014, then my first sub-two half marathon in 2016 and then this year). I really enjoyed the weekend and hope to be back again before three more years pass. w
What’s next on your race agenda? If you are running the Cherry Blossom Ten Miler in DC, say hi if you see me out there!