Race Report: Dawg Dash 10K 2006

Yesterday morning I ran the 10K Dawg Dash. I ran the 5K last year as my first ever race so I was excited to run this race again. I had my usual pre-race breakfast of plain oatmeal with honey and a banana while listening to the audio coverage of the Chicago marathon. Then in was off to campus where I left my bag at my office and warmed up by running over to Husky Stadium. The weather was beautiful. It was warmer than I’d expected so I tied my long sleeved top around my waist and ran in my tank top. The 5K race started about 10 minutes late and 6 minutes after that the 10K race began. My goal was to run at my half-marathon pace (HMP) for at least the first 4 miles of the race so I lined up right at the 9:00 min/mile sign. Here are my mile splits and my comments:

Mile	Split	Comments
1	8:35	oops started out too fast
2	9:13	better, slowed down a tiny bit too much
3	8:23	where did that come from?
4	9:29	pretty good considering this mile was uphill
5	8:34	why is everyone passing me on the downhill?
6	8:25	dig in! dig in!
0.2	1:23	sprint to the finish!
Total	54:02	average pace: 8:42 min/mile

I’ve never claimed to be the greatest judge of pace (especially when surrounded by other runners) and as you can see I was all over the board. I actually averaged 8:55 min/mile over the first 4 miles so I guess that was close to my goal but I’m not a big fan of the variability! In light of this I’ve decided to try and run with the 2:00 pace group at the half-marathon. I’m not sure how that will fit in with my walking/eating/hydration plans but I figure, why not leave the pacing to the pros!

It looks like I met all 3 of the goals that I set. I have to admit that the race wasn’t easy and the idea of running more than twice the distance 5 weeks from now seems a little overwhelming. Of course it didn’t help that I had the sniffles at the start of the race and by mile 2 thought that the cold might have migrated down into my chest. I swear I thought it was just the sniffles, I know that running with a chest cold is not a good idea. I feel pretty good today though so I don’t think I’m coming down with a full fledged cold. That’s a good thing since the next 4 weeks of training are going to be tough. I’m up for it though!

Update: Here are my official stats for the race:
Gun time: 0:54:36.8
Net (chip) time: 54:02
Place overall: 492/854 (42 percentile) [Note: places are based on gun time]
Place females: 153/396 (61 percentile)
Place age group: 66/154 (57 percentile)