Saturday, April 9, 2011

Bellaire Trolley 5k 2011 1st Overall 15:53



















You'll have to pardon my awful formatting. My normal blog editor is MIA so I'm manually editing my posts in HTML, which is awesome. (sarcasm)



I was definitely looking forward to this race as it is definitely one of the fastest 5k courses in the area. The past few times I had been in the race the weather was perfect and this contributed to some pretty fast times. I was unable to race this event last year due to dead legs from the marathon



This time I brought my family along. We arrived early and I noticed that there was a kids mile race and asked my son if he wanted to do it. Of course he said yes, and proceeded to run 8:03 for the mile. Not bad for 6, but I think we're going to keep him down at the sprints :-)



The weather was a little humid which is something I've never experienced on this course. I was told Colin Carroll was there but I was less concerned about racing and more concerned about getting a fast time in the books. Around 8:00 the gun went off and we took off. The first mile I was all by my lonesome. I went out at 4:59 with the goal of being sub 5. This was accomplished without too much effort. The problem arose at about 1.5 miles in. I noticed my pace was fading pretty badly with the same perceived effort. I tried to increase my effort level a bit but I knew it wasn't going to happen on this day. So I accepted fate and cruised right along until the last .1 when I became aware that I still had a chance at a sub 16 5k. I finished the last .1 in 24 seconds showing that I still had a bit of spring in the legs. The final time was 15:53. Not bad, but nothing special either. About par for the course. I was able to get my 2nd win of the year which is always a good thing and I'll take it. I have plenty of speed in the legs but it seems I need a good old fashioned boost in mileage to keep me going later on in races. I'm in luck because that's what I have planned.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

it looks like you run in rockets? I fucking love those shoes :D

Anonymous said...

nevermind, i just took a closer look and realized i was completely wrong on that one...

Anonymous said...

What type of flats do you wear, also what type of training shoes do you sport for workouts? thanks.

Bill Blancett said...

Anonymous,

This is an excellent question that I have been struggling with the past few years. Let me start with what I've been doing the last few years and then what I've been doing recently.

The previous few years I went minimal. The thought was if my shoes were lighter I would be able to move quicker. Pretty simplistic I know, but it was something different to try. I also wanted to build up my calves and the rest of my lower legs and feet. This worked initially as my times continued to drop. But was it the shoes or the training? As my times have begun to stagnate the last few years I began to wonder whether I was beating up my legs a little too much in races because after great starts I would fade big time at the end, no matter what shape I was in. I wore adizero PRs (3GS) for my racing flats and some light weight puma flats I won in a race.

Recently I decided to go another route and do something in between. I picked up some 7oz Brooks Green Silences that I won in a race. I have had improving results since. I've also started wearing my 9oz Adidas Bostons for my speed work and have been having good results.

So the results of my experimentation is to not get something too heavy or you'll be too slow. Don't get something too light or you'll beat up your legs. What is the correct fit for you? You'll only find that out through experimentation.

Bill Blancett said...

Autocorrect skewed my sentence above ^^^. I meant to say Adizero PR and that they were 3oz not 3GS.