Measurements in pain or GAWRSH I like running
In my life, I would bet I have run races with a distance of 5 kilometers in the neighborhood of 50 times. When I enter a 5k, I cannot say how much this experience helps me, but after my first ever 5 mile race yesterday, I'm going to guess on the side of immensely. From the get-go, my mind was very focused on the nearly 2 mile difference between a 5k and a 5 miler. I tried to slow my pace so that I could better sustain my effort. My intent for every mile was 6 minutes, but the first came out more like 5:53. I was a little jumpy and 20 or so people were off to the races and I couldn't completely let them go. It isn't my nature. Plus, there was a woman up ahead and with a nod to feminists and the crop of female runners who could crush me, I still didn't really want to get beat by a woman.

With an internal monologue in full-on nag mode and my body already starting to complain, I crossed two miles in 12:10. The third mile clicked off in 6:01 and I was at 18:11. A 5k would've been over by now, but I was again reminded of my decision to join the country in eschewing the metric system. There was a group 30 or so seconds in front of me and a few stragglers off of that group. I set my sights to pick off the stragglers in the next couple of miles and see if I could pull my time down a bit. I held what I still believe to be an appropriate level of optimism mixed in with the realism coursing through my veins.

I picked off one pretty quickly and moved on to the next. Heading up a hill, I pulled even with another and tried to coax him to go after the last straggler with me. He wished me well, but would have none of it. This point was somewhere near mile 4 and the hills were picking up or I was being crushed down; either way I was really looking for the little orange sign with the 4 on it so I could gear up for the last mile. Mile 4 came in 24:23. I was tiring and the hills kept coming. I couldn't seem to close on the last straggler and then to make matters worse, a man I'd passed some time ago made his way into my peripheral vision. I wasn't entirely unhappy to see him, I had hopes that he could keep me going strong(ish). We descended a hill and were heading past a water stop. I took a rare grab for some aqua, not something I would do in a 5k, and had a gulp. This turned out to be less refreshing than I had hoped. Or perhaps it was the hill looming in front of me.

I climbed the hill and desperately tried to keep my new mate behind me. We neared the top of the hill and I could see that our left turn would take us up another hill. In this moment, the hills, the miles, the glass of water, and weariness proved too much for me and I could only watch the man pass me by. I was broken. He pulled away. As we got halfway up the next hill I had one last spurt to dig out, but it amounted to only a few pathetic surging steps of a weary man unaccustomed to such a distance. I finished in 30:45, good enough for 15th place and 9 seconds a mile off of my goal. The good news is I have a new personal record (PR) in the 5 mile distance. Most of me would like to say that I'm headed back to the 5k where I feel at home, but it turns out that next up on the calendar is my first shot to go after a new PR. The records, they are made for the breaking.