Race Report: Harry's Spring RunOff 2014

Most of you dreaded this winter. Not me. I had my own tormentor.

Because regarding winter, I had no excuses. When I committed to train for a strong May marathon, I knew I'd be putting myself in uncomfortable territory. While I am a year-long runner, I typically focus on fall marathons for peak performances. But that's not what I wanted out of this year. If I were to hit May, then I'd have to train hard during this winter. You all know well the story of this winter. Some 35 extreme weather days, windchills we've never seen in many years and snow -- lots of it that made our footing iffy.

Was it winter that struck fear into me? Not really. I feared Wednesdays.

I remember one Wednesday about 14 weeks ago, I had signed up for the BlackToe team and our first quality workout was 8x1000. We couldn't do the Ex because it was an icy mess, so we moved to the waterfront trail. It was dark, slippery and we started to hammer those tempo paces. Back then, we were trying for 4:20s.

The Spring RunOff was what kicked of my adult racing habit. Back in 2005, when it was sponsored by PowerBar, I ran my very first road race. I was hooked, on racing, on pushing myself and on this hard course. I've since run it most years (and a few times done what I call The Double) no matter what my fitness or what I'm training for. My PB was set in 2008 when I was training for the Cincinnati Flying Pig Marathon and using the Pfitzinger-Douglas training program. That mark, 33:57, has stood for so many years.

This year, we took winter on. We ran right into the -15C, hammering out intervals, tempo runs and MP Wednesdays. Our tempo sessions were universally dreaded. We'd get a cryptic line in our training program, something like "3km warm up. 4km, 3, 2,1, start @ T" and we shuddered. My pace group members would all show up nervously and we'd go out to 'work'. But teamwork prevailed, and we always ended up the day laughing, stronger, more confident. Then on Thursday, I'd go back out there, sometimes running 15K some 9 hours after doing a 17K tempo session.

The paces got faster. What was 4:20s would become 4:15s (It was our fault, coach would say, as we'd do the intervals too fast). By the time March became April, he had us going at 4:05s for tempo (one hour race pace.). On the way to my new half and 30K PBs, our paces continued to drop. We'd start tempo sessions doing 3:55s and realize we were going too fast. We hated Wednesdays, but Wednesdays made us better.

THE RACE
I asked the coach for a race plan, telling him my legs were still a little banged up from Around the Bay. I told him my PB was 4:15 pace and that it was soft. He advised me to be careful on the hills and hammer it home from 5-7.5K.

The day was windy, gusting up to 55-60K, and it was a chilly 1C before windchill. I arrived at the site an hour before race start and checked in my bag. I waited for a few minutes, then started a warmup jog, trying to hit around 5K at a recovery pace. That helped me warm up and I realized how beneficial it is to run before a short race. You're not going to hit a wall with 8K and I'd rather have my legs (and heart) ready to go).

I met up with teammate Mike and we lined up in the front corral. We made loose plans to run together, maybe go for 4:10s.

Mike and I. Photo: Alison Post