Baltimore Women's Classic Recap

On Sunday I ran my 3rd Baltimore Women's Classic 5K.  I find myself looking forward to this race every year.  It's an all-female race, and proceeds from the entry fees benefit women's cancer initiatives.  The atmosphere is fun and friendly and filled with camaraderie.  Women of all ages participate and there are many mother-daughter teams that run together.  There are also really nice perks like a finisher's medal, long stemmed rose, and cold towel at the end; things you usually only get at the half-marathon level.  There are many women for which this is their first race ever, and the BWC aims to celebrate the accomplishments of them, and all runners who complete the course.  And although I didn't coach this year, I still saw a few familiar faces throughout the course, including one of my favorite fellow coaches from last summer.

Going into this race, I knew I had PR'ed here last year, so of course I would have loved to better my time this go-round, but truth be told, I've done ZERO speed work at all this year (my one and only attempt at speed work occurred last Thursday when I decided to just go out and run a really fast 5K.  I logged my fastest mile ever at a 7:15 split and I nearly peed my pants when the Map My Run computer lady shouted that out!), plus I've only been running a couple times a week lately.  With boot camp taking up a large portion of my workout schedule, plus the shoe drama I've been going through for weeks, my runs lately had been fewer and shorter. 

If you recall, I tried out a new cushioned shoe (Brooks Glycerin) and some Newtons (read about my experiences here).  Well, I finally settled back on my tried and true Vomeros, but this time with Spenco Total Support insoles.  (The purpose of them is to bridge the space in my super-high arches in hopes that will alleviate the strain on shins.)  After trying 2 pairs of shoes, I really didn't want the running store to have to continue to send back shoes on my behalf!  Honestly, if I could get a job testing running shoes somewhere I would be in heaven and perhaps after trying out hundreds of shoes, I'd be able to find the perfect fit, but right now I'm hoping the new Vomero + insole combo works some magic!

Jillyruns/Instagram

 

 

So far, I've run in them 5-6 times and [KNOCK ON WOOD, times a million] I haven't had any shin issues.  *Keeping fingers crossed*

 

So other than not be prepared to run this race fast, how else did I feel about it?  Well, I worked Saturday night until 11:15pm, which ended up giving me about 5 hours of sleep so it was a no go on the 'well rested' part of the preparation as well!  And lastly, I forgot to buy bagels which is what I always eat before races so I had to improvise.  Lo and behold, a Kaiser roll with jelly.  Pre-race fuel of champions?!  I mean who wouldn't want a toasted hamburger bun for breakfast.  I know what YOU all are having tomorrow morning.  You can thank me later for that "recipe" ;)

 

 

 

I don't run 5K's very often so I always forget that you're supposed to warm up beforehand.  In longer distance races, the first mile or two serves as the warm up, but when the race is only 3 miles long, you need to be running like a bat out of hell from the get go!  So, once again, didn't warm up and for some reason I got a cramp after mile 1?!! Ahhhhhhhhhh, that rarely happens to me.  I'm pretty sure I was under-hydrated and just really sleepy from working so much Fri and Sat night.  And not warmed up for the pace at which I was running.  Ahh well.  So, I ran the remaining 2 miles with a cramp and feeling like I was running REALLY slowly.  I only heard them yell out my first mile split which was around 8:05 and didn't glance at my Garmin the rest of the race.  So I felt like I was going to come in at like 26 or 27 mins. 

 

Well imagine my surprise when I crossed the finish line in 25 something.  Whaaaat?!  I finished in 25:37 which was only 20 seconds slower than last year's 25:17.  Not too shabby for being pretty unprepared.  I know lots of you out there are probably waaaaaaay faster than me (uh, Lauren from Breathe Deeply and Smile finished a full FOUR minutes faster than me in 21:36!!! Incredible!) but 8:15 min/miles are fast for me!  Now if I can just find a nice flat 5K course somewhere, perhaps I'll break 25 mins one day!!  Oh and for reference the first place finisher came in at 18:03?! Is that even human?! 

 

Jillyruns/Instagram

 

 

Hope you all had a great first weekend of summer!  The Summer Solstice makes me infinitely happy :)

 

 

Run any races this weekend?

 

Do you enjoy the 3 miles of pain known at the 5K?!?!

 



 

 

 

 



Weekend recap: Baltimore Women's Classic, Supermoon and #Skywire

For the past few months, I had been volunteering as a running coach for a group of women who were training for a 5K.  It was a wonderful experience not only because I had so much fun doing it, but also because I met so many great women!  Well, the race they were training for finally took place yesterday here in Baltimore.  The Baltimore Women's Classic is one of the largest all-female races in the country and over 3200 women raced yesterday!  I knew it would be pretty impossible to find all of the women from the program in that sea of people but surprisingly I ran into a few along the course.  It was a great opportunity for me to pat them on the shoulder and give them some encouragement along the way! One of the ladies thanked me for stopping to acknowledge her and said "I'm going to keep you in my sights Coach!".  I also ran into a couple of people at the finish line in the race village.  As far as my personal race, I didn't really have much of a strategy.  It had been a year since I ran a competitive 5K and I don't really train for fast short distances.  In my mind I was hoping for a sub 25.  Well, I missed it by 16 seconds! Don't you just hate when that happens?!  I was also hoping for negative splits but in actuality I didn't really train for that either.  Negative splits generally just naturally happen for me in my runs because I usually start out slower and gain speed throughout, but it's not something I'm consciously doing.  When I checked my Garmin after the race, I saw I ran a fast 1st mile, slower 2nd mile and my fastest 3rd mile so I guess I somewhat negative split it :)  I ended up 30th in my age group - finishing 199 out of 3211 runners overall. Not too shabby I suppose but the fastest female finisher ran a 16 minute race?! WHAT? Mind blown.

All in all it was a great race and I actually enjoyed the quickness of it and the fun atmosphere.  I'm thinking about squeezing in a few more 5K's this summer before the Runner's World Half in October.  My sister just signed up for a summer training program and will be running her first 5K in the fall and I couldn't be more excited!  I'm hoping to do a race with her when she completes her program.  Ok now for some pics:

Post race - sweaty and smiling :)

 

 

Me, One of our trainees Ashley, and Wendy another great coach



 

 

After the race, I came home and settled in for an evening of Supermoon and Sky Wire.  Let me explain.

 

I am kind of an astronomy nerd so I was excited that yesterday was supposed to be the biggest and brightest moon of the year.  It certainly was beautiful last night but it wasn't one of those low hanging giant orange moons that we sometimes get in the fall that look like they're right out of a movie (Harvest moon maybe?).  So I came back inside and mentally prepared for this madness:

 

 via

 

Did anyone else tune in to the Discovery Channel last night for Sky Wire Live?!  Nik Wallenda is a professional wire walker who decided he was going to walk across the Grand Canyon yesterday with no safety net and no tether.  I have to admit this was incredibly hard to watch.  I was simultaneously watching, tweeting about this (the tweets last night were hilarious), texting with my sister and sweating like a maniac.  I just can't wrap my head around someone's desire and ability to do something like this.  It is completely beyond my comprehension.  However, just because I don't understand it, doesn't necessarily make it wrong. I mean if this guy is truly living out his God given talent and purpose on earth who I am or anyone else to say that it's irresponsible or crazy? I do have issues with him having children and having them watch this, but by all accounts it appears that this is truly what this man was meant to do and I don't think he could stop even if he wanted to.  It seems like wire walking is in his DNA?! In any case, it made me think that if we all tapped into our truest selves and discovered what we were put here to do, we could all achieve things that seem impossible.  This wire walking is extreme, but weren't the worlds greatest inventors, writers, artists, scientists, etc considered crazy or extremist as well?  I guess if we have the courage to tap into our weirdness some pretty great things can come of it.  Whatever you think of this guy, you have to admit he has great courage to follow his dreams. 

 

*Fun fact - Nik Wallenda performed in Baltimore last summer! He walked on a wire strung across the Inner Harbor to celebrate the opening of Ripley's Believe it or Not down here.  I didn't get to see him live because I was working, but I did have a view of the crowd outside my office! You can read the article here.

 

 

My questions for you today:

 

When was your last race and what distance was it? Do you enjoy 5K's?

 

Did you watch Sky Wire last night? What are your thoughts?