Terrier Classic, 3k

I returned to Boston on Friday night for the Terrier Classic. Once again, I would try to break 10:15 in the 3k.

[Digression: Both the Terrier Classic and the Valentine Invitational, hosted by BU, are two-day meets. The two days they chose are Friday and Saturday. The women race on Friday, and the men race on Saturday, in both meets, every year. How is this fair? The women have to miss class or work to race on Friday, and the men just show up the next day and race on a reasonable weekend day. I think they should either switch them between Terrier and Valentines, or switch both year to year.]

I was in the third section of four for the 3k. When the gun went off, somehow I didn't get out very well and got way behind -- actually third to last. I am not sure how this happened, as I usually get off the line well. Maybe I should take Mark's advice and crack my toes the next time.

Anyway, this put me in the position of having to pass hordes of people. I went through the first lap in 39 (to run 10:15, I had to run 41 seconds per lap). I passed some people on the turn, just as the person in front of me was passing some people, meaning I had to run in lane 3, adding lots of extra distance. Grrr.

I went through the 800 in a perfect 2:42. (I did 4 x 800 averaging 2:42.6 a few weeks ago). I locked in behind a girl in blue, and hung on. The pack was hitting perfect 41's. After a few laps, they ran a 42, so I went to pass a few people -- on the turn, of course, adding more distance. A poor choice on my part. I ended up in third place, and once again went through the 1600 in 5:29, just one second off of perfect 10:15 pace.

The two runners in front of me pulled away a little. I reeled them in. We went through 2k in 6:52. I am always bad at simple arithmetic when I am running fast, but I added 26 to 52 and got something that ended in 8, and thought, hmmm, probably 10:18, that's too slow. Darn it.

The next lap they pulled away again. I reeled them in. But they pulled away, and I couldn't keep up. I ran 43 for a lap (luckily I didn't hear this when Alan told me). I was running alone in third with the two girls out of reach ahead of me. With 2.5 laps to go, a girl passed me. I passed her back right away and started to kick. With two laps to go, the time clock said 9:00. I sadly realized that I probably couldn't run a 75 for the last 400.

I was running as hard as I could; my legs were burning. I even thought to myself, "this is the hardest I have ever run." I sprinted the last two laps, and got nipped in the final stretch, so I ended up fourth. Two laps of sprinting turned out to be an 82-second 400, exactly the pace of 41 seconds per lap that I should be running. It's crazy to think that I had to run so hard just to run 41 seconds!

I ended up running 10:21.95, an 0.3 second improvement over my previous 3k. So it's a PR! But I still have seven seconds to take off. (results)

Exciting: FloTrack videoed all the races. Here is a video of my race. I am eighth from the right on the starting line, with a white singlet and black shorts. From the back, my singlet appears to have a large red diamond. Enjoy the video. Here, I'll even embed it in this post (I'm the one with the red diamond and black shorts just to the left of the "play" arrow):