In the words of the immortal Brian Collins, boom goes the dynamite!
I murdered that race. Murdered it. Forty-one minutes and fifty-four seconds. That's over eight minutes better than the rough goal I'd set for myself, over three minutes better than the stretch goal. Finished 726th out of 10,600 people, and 197th out of 1,131 men between 20 and 29.
Most amazingly of all, I did it with relative ease. Felt really good, from start to finish, and I think I could have done it even faster. But as probably generally happens with these races, I spent the first few kilometers weaving around and passing slower runners,* and it probably wasn't until the 2km mark that I was really able to get any pace going. And even then, I was pretty surprised to find myself passing people for pretty much the whole race, right through to the end.
*The race had a self-seeding system, meaning you're supposed to line up at the start based on how quickly you think you'll finish. So after I positioned myself near the front of the group that was aiming to finish between 45 minutes and one hour, it was a bit frustrating to see people who were WALKING, or kids who clearly were always going to burn out after a kilometer, starting ahead of me. Then again, for most of my pre-teen and early teen years, I ran each of the Fourth of July 5km races in Pacific Palisades, and I definitely used to be one of those kids. So I guess I understand.
But it was a fun race, a beautiful spring day,* and a great course: from North Sydney, up over the Harbour Bridge, by the Opera House, into the city, looping through the Botanical Gardens and finishing back at the Opera House.
*The day before this, Sydney absurdly had its hottest day of 2008. This includes January and February when it actually was, you know, summer.
They apparently take pictures and video of us on the course. Once I get those, and assuming I don't look like death, I'll post them on here sometime soon.
Where to go from here? Is there a next step? I really want to do the City 2 Surf run next August, assuming I'm not visiting the States again at the same time. And then for the Sydney Running Festival next year, maybe it's on to the half marathon (although I think that's a bit of a stretch) or possibly setting my eyes on doing the Bridge Run in under 40 minutes. That may be the real stretch.
I murdered that race. Murdered it. Forty-one minutes and fifty-four seconds. That's over eight minutes better than the rough goal I'd set for myself, over three minutes better than the stretch goal. Finished 726th out of 10,600 people, and 197th out of 1,131 men between 20 and 29.
Most amazingly of all, I did it with relative ease. Felt really good, from start to finish, and I think I could have done it even faster. But as probably generally happens with these races, I spent the first few kilometers weaving around and passing slower runners,* and it probably wasn't until the 2km mark that I was really able to get any pace going. And even then, I was pretty surprised to find myself passing people for pretty much the whole race, right through to the end.
*The race had a self-seeding system, meaning you're supposed to line up at the start based on how quickly you think you'll finish. So after I positioned myself near the front of the group that was aiming to finish between 45 minutes and one hour, it was a bit frustrating to see people who were WALKING, or kids who clearly were always going to burn out after a kilometer, starting ahead of me. Then again, for most of my pre-teen and early teen years, I ran each of the Fourth of July 5km races in Pacific Palisades, and I definitely used to be one of those kids. So I guess I understand.
But it was a fun race, a beautiful spring day,* and a great course: from North Sydney, up over the Harbour Bridge, by the Opera House, into the city, looping through the Botanical Gardens and finishing back at the Opera House.
*The day before this, Sydney absurdly had its hottest day of 2008. This includes January and February when it actually was, you know, summer.
They apparently take pictures and video of us on the course. Once I get those, and assuming I don't look like death, I'll post them on here sometime soon.
Where to go from here? Is there a next step? I really want to do the City 2 Surf run next August, assuming I'm not visiting the States again at the same time. And then for the Sydney Running Festival next year, maybe it's on to the half marathon (although I think that's a bit of a stretch) or possibly setting my eyes on doing the Bridge Run in under 40 minutes. That may be the real stretch.
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