Yesterday I ran in my first "live" race since February... the Crush Covid 3 miler. The cynical side of me questions how staging for profit road race is doing anything to crush covid… that being said, it was a safely executed race and I was pleasantly surprised how easy it was to maintain social distance.
The race was conducted in 5 waves starting a minute apart. The waves were all stationed in their own waiting areas in an open field with plenty of space. People didn't really start to assemble until about 5 minutes before the race.
I lined up in the front of the 1st wave with my pink vaporflys and pink bandana... and then we were off. I took off with a pack of 4 for the first ~200 meters. After that the guy who wound up winning the race took off and left me in the dust. I already knew who he was and knew I had no shot a keeping his pace (5:23 for the first 1.5 miles, 5:27 for the entirety). I was running with 2 other younger guys for the next 200 meters just trying to stay relaxed and not go out too fast. After about 400 we hit a 180 turnabout. I cut the inside tight and wound up ditching the other guys.
After that I was by myself for the next 1.50 miles. I hit the 1st mile at 5:45 pace which was maybe a bit too fast but not unreasonable. The race was two laps of 1.5 miles and I hit 1.5 at 8:50. Soon into my second lap I started lapping people who were either walking or had started in later waves. For the most part I found my own lane and had no problem passing probably about 100 people. The only incident was at a sharp turnaround at about 2.25 miles where I got hung up a bit which probably cost me a few seconds.
After that it was nearly a straight shot to the finish line. I was hurting pretty bad by that point. I wasn't quite running at 100% but it was close. The weather didn't help as it was in the upper 70s, hot, sunny, and humid. Plus running by myself didn't help me dig in. I was hoping that I was going to hammer with 800 to go but instead I just held on, running mile 2 in 5:58 and mile 3 in 6:02.
After one final turn there was a short sprint to the finish. The race director announced me as the 2nd place winner as I surged in... I pushed through the finish, careful to not stop my watch in the photos.
It was a good run overall and I'm happy to log something "official" that was sub 6 minute pace. I was hoping for closer to 17:40 but the weather, my pacing, and my fitness didn't quite deliver.
It was good to race and good to taper and get some recovery after months of hard training. I'm thinking one more easy week and then back to serious training again!
Starting Strong
Finishing Strong (besides the guy I almost lapped photo bombing my glory)
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