Running on a Saturday

Hey everyone,
First off, I wanna apologize for my hiatus. I pledge to be better about keeping with the updates.

Well, Asher and I are enjoying our summer time in Washington. It was very long awaited, we have been itching for some heat since liiiike April. With the summer heat so came my running fitness and since early July, I have been running pretty well.
I ran a few track races in Canada and did some time trials here locally with my coach. The track races were goin well so I thought to try and extend my race distance a bit. So, about a week ago I started to pursue the Army 10 Miler team.  I made sure there was still a race opportunity to qualify for the Ft. Lewis team and after I pitched the idea to my coach, and he was onboard, we went for it. Coach gave me a good race plan and after that it was all just some running and dealing with a little bit of pain.

Here are a few race clips from early in the race. Asher got to excited late in the race to remember to film me winning so these clips are from early in the race before I put it down. It's okay though her excitement was well received especially as I started to hurt with about a mile and a half to go.


On to the race! It played out just as my coach said it would. It was an 8.65 mile race which is a big distance especially for me, as I normally race 800's and 1500's on the track. Coach told me to get out very comfortable and feel relaxed 2 miles in. At the 2 mile mark my job was to start closing in on whoever was ahead of me. So I worked for the next 2 miles to catch the leader. Catching the leader occured earlier than I thought it would. We were neck and neck about halfway through the race. Coach told me to just settle in with the leader once I caught him. I did just that. After two miles of running with him I started to get a little bored and kinda antsy. Coach advised me to move with a mile and half to go but with 2.5 to go I just couldn't wait andy more and I  started laying down the hammer. From that point on it was all horses to the barn and I was just grinding away. I was pretty pooped with about 400 meter to go and at that point I had to reach a little deeper to finish out strong. I was able to put a little over a minute on the previous leader. The time was also a PR for me.
I was happy about the race and the way it played out. I felt very controlled for a majority of the distance and the plan I was given worked perfectly, so that is always nice.

My splits were something around:
5:45-5:33-5:27-5:25-5:33-5:38-5:21-5:20 and the last .65 was at 5:05 pace.

A few things will come from me racing well. I have a chance to run for the Army National 10 Miler Team in DC in October. I will find out this week if I will get the opportunity. If I have earned a spot on the team, I will race against the likes of Mexico, Japan and Brazil. If that falls through I will for sure race in DC representing Ft Lewis and compete against other military bases for the Commanders Cup. Ft. Lewis has a really great look at winning which could be really exciting.

I have one more 1500m track race this Saturday and then I am going to transition my training to focus on the 10 mile distance. I have a few rabbits lined up so it should be great opportunity.

I hope this update finds everyone well. Ill be sure to drop a post after next weekend!

Much Love and Mileage
-dh