Sunday, October 25, 2009

Running Around

This weekend has been particularly pleasant. I've been trying to decide if I should split it up into a series of posts, but that is fairly unlikely to happen. Instead, I'll write a bit about the 10k. I'd received a flier for it last week, but didn't read it carefully enough to not the registration deadline, which had passed. Fortunately, my sister has taught me the value of race-day registration, so we went down and gave it a try. Perhaps in conjunction with the laissez faire flair the Lebanese do so well, I was able to get registered for the princely sum of 10,000LBP (~$7.00)

I've only run one other 10k, so I don't have much experience with the mechanics, but I was surprised that they were giving out the shirts before the race. It turned out to be logistically impractical for the family to come with me to the start of the race so my clothing options were a bit limited. I ended up going with layering the race shirt over what I was already wearing. Not ideal, but what the heck.

In order to get a shirt, I had to show up about an hour and a half before the starting time. Fortunately, Steve Jobs and the miracle of podcasting kept me suitably entertained. 80% of the crowd appeared to be about 17. This could be a factor of me getting older, but I rather doubt it. I was pleased to see the race getting such broad participation, being that it was on a Saturday night and all.

Since I'm not the type to push around in lines, I decided to hang out near the back of the crowd. This turned out to be a mistake, as the above mentioned crowd of teenagers was more interested in goofing off than actually running. Whatever floats their boat, but it took a while for the pack to sort itself out. Next time, I'll make sure I'm in the first third and not the last third. Because the first mile had a couple of hills to it, things sorted themselves out nicely.

While my GPS watch is very confused, I was surprised to see that it did successfully track me through the course. It seems to be a bit fuzzy on where the land ends and the sea begins, but the relative route is accurate.

With my first 10k I automatically adopted the pace I keep for my 2-3 mile runs, which made things harder than they needed to be. For this race, I purposely tried to slow down to between an 8.5 and 9.25minute mile, which turned out to be very pleasant. I think I could do better next time. As it happened, I ended up having about a 52 minute time.

I had a great experience, got a swank microfiber shirt, medal, and the feeling that my fitness goals are more on track than they have been. All in all, a great night!

3 comments:

  1. See it's all about the shirt:) That and not being mis-directed and running an extra mile and half:)

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  2. way to go! i'm so impressed by people who can run...one of the many talents i lack.

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  3. Good run and a good pace. With a little more experience you should be able to be a sub-50 minute 10Ker. Congratulations!!!

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