Raven Run 10K Race Report

To say my first 10K was eventful would be an understatement.

It started with me sleeping in and not leaving town until 8:00 am. Race start was at 9:00 am and Salmon Arm was 115 km away. Then it involved me racing through windy roads, averaging 130km/hour while Eric gripped the door handle and yelled at me for passing on a solid line. Eric went a little picture-happy this time around since he missed taking many pictures of my first half, so this will be a picture-filled post!

After all that, I was still seven minutes late for the race start. But, I’d drove all that way, so I was going to race.

I got my number and headed off, to say I felt discouraged being the lone runner was an understatement. I hadn’t had a chance to fuel properly so all I’d had was a measly granola bar, I didn’t get to go pee first so I was full of water. Then my iPod died six minutes into the run. Ugh. Here I am, starting the race, alone.

I took off, not a single runner in site since they’d all started seven minutes early, the first kilometre was all downhill and I hit the first km marker at 4:30. Pretty fast. It was all uphill from there and the next kilometre took me eight minutes. It was then a good 1.5 km climb before it came downhill again; and low and behold I saw another runner! I thought for sure I was going to come in last place so I was really giddy when I passed this runner! I figured that first 1.5 km climb was the “big hill” that they were talking about in the race description. It wasn’t. Kilometres 3-5 were all straight up hill.

That was the last BIG hill, but the next 4 kilometres was all rolling hills. I managed to pass a few more people in that time and then the last kilometre was downhill so I just opened up and sprinted as fast as I could. I stopped once around the 7th kilometre to try and stretch my knee out, it was really tight from all the uphill/downhill and no warm-up. Other than that I ran the whole way. Here I am finishing strong, that guy in the orange shirt was telling me to eat the grass for lunch; so I did!

My original goal was to finish in under an hour. But after seeing how hilly the course was I re-evaluated and decided I wanted to finish in under an hour and 5 minutes. I ended up finishing in 1 hour and 52 seconds (by my stopwatch) and I’m super happy with that. Unfortunately, my official time is 1:07:33. Oh well, that’ll teach me for sleeping in.

I averaged 9:48 miles during this 10K, which is quick for me. Then I did a “recovery” 4 miles on Monday afternoon and averaged a 10:00 pace, that used to be a FAST run for me, not a recovery! The speed workouts are paying off!

On the way back we stopped at some fresh produce stands and bought some awesome, locally-grown B.C. produce. So I’m going to pull a “food blogger” today and throw some pics in here. Of course, by now, it’s almost all gone!

One of my favourite things about living down here is all the delicious, fresh, local produce you can get! YUM. You can’t beat B.C. cherries!

A few other notes:

- My hair cut is growing on me, literally and figuratively. Thanks for all your kind words yesterday!

- I went to see Julie & Julia yesterday, it was fantastic. I would definitely recommend it!

- My shins are starting to hurt again while running, only it’s a different kind of pain than shin splints; more bearable. But it’s a constant “pressure” that lasts through my whole run. Does this mean I need new shoes? I’ve put approximately 450 miles on the ones I’ve got right now.