Half-Assed Runner

Today I participated in a local 6 mile race: Walk On Waconia.  I love the Lake Waconia area (it’s where I do my long training runs) and the event was cheap ($18) and pretty small (400 participants with a lot of walkers and spread across two distances).

Walk On Waconia Shirt

The weather was a bit ugly.  The forecast had called for rain and it was overcast with temps in the mid-40s with a decent wind.  I decided to go with shorts and a tech shirt and never got too cold.

Walk On Waconia Start

For once I was early to the packet pickup.  Parking was plentiful and I parked about 200 feet from the finish line/packet pick up.  I grabbed my bib and long-sleeved cotton shirt and dropped off some food items (the race is a benefit for the local food shelf).  We were to be bussed to the far side of the lake to the starting area for the 6 mile race.  This initially was a 5.5 mile race (even says it on the race shirts) but a few days before the run the race director sent out an email stating that the race was now 6 miles and to “enjoy the extra steps”.

I got on the first of two buses and went to sit in the back seat (high school flashback).  There were only a dozen or so people on the bus at that time.  I just figured that most of the people were on the other bus.  About 15 minutes later, a huge stream of people poured out of the building where the packet pickup took place and started to board the busses.  Both busses were packed by the time we left.

Dirt Road

When we exited the bus I was happy to see familiar ground.  The race would start on the same trail I use for my long runs.  At 9:10 the race director counted down from 5 and we were off.

I planned to run this race slow and easy.  I hoped to finish under 60 minutes, but was going to just try to run without stopping, especially after last weekend’s 10 mile fiasco.

We only spent about a quarter-mile on the trail before veering off onto a dirt road to hug the lake.  I was hoping that this would not be the surface for too long.  It wasn’t.  We started running on pavement again about a half mile later.  It was at this point that we hit the first water stop.  This surprised me a bit, but made sense that the 10 milers would be hitting mile 4.5 at this point.  The water stops were well stocked with water, energy drinks, and fruit.

Around Lake Waconia

I had been slowly passing runners since the beginning.  I finally hit a good pace and shared it with a tall woman for most of the race.  I would stay stride for stride with her until the second water stop where I would very slowing increase the distance between us over the final 3 miles.

This was a hilly run.  All but one hill were of the long, slow climb variety.  I was able to handle the hills pretty well.  My legs won the battle with my brain this time.

Walk On Waconia

This was only my second time using Endomondo and my new phone (RAZR Maxx). The phone is larger than my old iPhone, but it wasn’t a pain to carry.  I really miss Runmeter.  I especially miss being able to set the interval at which the app announces your split times.  Endomondo only does mile announcements.  I will say that the GPS seems to be VERY accurate as I received the mile announcements within feet of the mile markers on the course.

Given that I just wanted to keep under a 10 minute per mile pace, I was happy to be around a 9:40 pace through the first 3 miles.  Especially with the hills.  We spent a good chunk of miles 2 through 4 on a rural highway hugging the left shoulder.  There were still good views of the lake and I had hit a comfortable stride, so I enjoyed this stretch.

City Paths

At mile 4 we headed east back into town.  I was still running around 9:30 per mile.  I felt pretty good.  I had also been closing on the larger pack of runners I could see in front of me.  All of this lead to me picking up the pace and I finished mile 5 just under 9 minutes.

By this point I had picked off two runners and was closing on a third.  We were now running on trails inside the city.  A few drops of rain did fall at this point.  I very much welcomed them, but was only rewarded with a few dozen fat drops.  There were a number of hills, but they were shorter ones rather than the long slow climbs earlier.  I finally picked off the runner ahead of me with about a third of a mile left (at the top of one of the short, steep hills).  I enjoyed a downhill and could see the giant church where the race finished ahead on my right.  I made the right turn and saw yet another hill.  I said to the race volunteer “Another hill?” and he replied “It’s the last one and it’s short.  Enjoy it.”

Elevation Chart - Check out that last hill

I started to power up the hill.  This bugger was STEEP.  In the span of two blocks I would go from lake level to what felt like a mountain top.  There was no way I was going to stop now, but by the time I crested the beast I felt a bit woozy.  I felt sick to my stomach for a brief period of time.  I recovered, but I had nothing left so I did not sprint the final 100 feet to the finish line.

Finish Line

I finished in just over 56 minutes.  My last mile was under 9 minutes.  I had run the last 4 miles progressively faster.  Negative splits.  I felt like a real runner.  Then I saw the first 10 miler finish about 5 minutes after it took me to finish 6 miles and that “real runner” feeling faded fast. 

I was really happy I ran this race.  It was nice to get a “win” after last weekend.  I tend to focus on my failures far more than my successes and was starting to doubt whether I had it in me to complete one half marathon…let alone 12.  My running mojo seems to be back now though.

Walk On Waconia Course Map