Race results here

I ventured out to Kansas on Saturday to race the Southlands 5k. Well, not Kansas per se, the race was held at the Aurora Southlands Mall, but it felt like a long drive for this Denverite. I have to admit, one of the things that I love about being in Denver is that I can find a race almost every weekend within a five mile radius of my house.

The past two years I had raced the Farmers 5000 in Wheatridge, so I decided to mix things up a bit and check out the scene in SE Aurora. The race was held in the center of the shopping area and the race essentially went around the perimeter of the Shopping Center. This made for a difficult course, as the Shopping Center is basically on a hill, so that meant you went up the hill, back down the hill, up the hill on the other side of the mall and then back down the hill.

At the starting line, I got into my normal no nonsense racing mode. That meant chatting with the lady behind me who was running with her Golden Doodle and she confirmed the one question that was running through my mind, yes they do not shed as much as a normal Golden Retriever (which is what I own, or for my readers living in Boulder, I am the Dog Guardian), so I filed that one under “mental notes: buying a new dog.”

At the start I noticed some fast runners, including the guy who won the Skirt Chaser 5k last weekend and another African was also in the field. When the race started the runners immediately started the climb up the hill, which seemed steeper than the hill I faced last weekend at the Skirt Chaser. I hit the first mile in 6:01, which I was ok with considering the tough climb, but at this point I was running alone.

The one regret/mistake that I made is that there were three women in front of me, all running together, with one other guy and I should have made a push on that first mile to join that group, they were probably 10 seconds ahead of me at the first mile.

The second mile was in 5:57, my legs felt flat, and I’m guessing that my big week of racing last week was catching up. The third mile started off back uphill again and I could still see the lead women’s pack, but I just didn’t have the motivation to try to catch them. One of my mental blocks is that I truly race for time, I’m not fast enough to contend for a top finish, and I honestly don’t care if I win my age group, etc. Thus, if the race is a tough course and I haven’t run the race before (to establish a baseline) I tend to be unmotivated. I think that’s what happened on this race day since I knew a PR was not possible, I ran alone the entire race, no one passed me after the first mile and I got lazy on that third and last mile which I ran in 6:12, to finish the race in 18:43.

I was disappointed in my performance, but I still had a fun time and since my training has been catered to a Marathon Training program, the real test is how I perform in the Denver Marathon, which is now only five weeks away!