Shamrock Run 2010

Well, the first race of the season has come and gone. For the second year in a row I jumped into the 8k Shamrock run in Portland today. It was much different than last year! First off, the weather was much better. Last year's race was run during miserable weather conditions while this year the sun was out! I even wore my shades :) As was the case last year, Meg ran the early race which was the 5k while I watched the bags and then raced the 8k an hour later. I entered this race today after the heaviest week of training I have done since build up to Ironman last year so I was unsure how I would perform. The 20 hours of training had pretty much zapped me, but I was excited to race for the first time in a while!

I watched Meg and her friends finish which was great. She did great considering all the shin trouble she has had lately. I am really proud of how she has weathered her injury set back and is now back and running!!! Great job honey! I then warmed up for a little bit and hit the start line. My goal going in was to run around 6:30 pace. I have done no speed work since last fall so everything has been run at low heart rates so far this year. This was going to be interesting! The gun went off and I with it. My legs were pretty heavy, but I clicked through the first mile somewhere around 6:20. I struggled a little bit on the climb up Broadway and Barber but was still averaging between 6:30 and 7. A few people that probably shouldn't have been passing me where, I was just too tired and sore to respond! I hate getting passed.

We made the turn on to Front and headed down towards the finish. The last mile was painful. I knew I was going to PR and was happy to be finishing soon. Last year I ran 35:40 something. This year I stopped my watch at 33:25. A 2min plus PR was great! I was proud of my effort. My pace ended up at 6:39 so I was very close to my goal of 6:30s. I'm still a little bummed that I don't have the speed yet. However, I know I need to look at the big picture and realize that I was 30seconds per mile faster than last year after a monster week of training including a fairly tough 4 hour ride yesterday. The speed will continue to come. Last year I ran a 3:33 marathon 7 weeks later. I was sick as a dog and probably could have ran 3:20ish. Knowing all this makes me feel great about today as well as where my fitness is. I'm excited for the upcoming season and look forward to running a fast half marathon in a little less than 2 months.

We finished off the morning with some food, beer and Irish dancing at the Thirsty Lion! Great fun. Hope everyone is well. Thanks for reading!

-T