The Cosley Run for the Animals in Wheaton was my first ever competitive long distance run, and for me it was an awesome experience. I am now completely hooked on distance running. I started the run with my friend Gene, and my brother-in law. Due to the fact that there were about 1300 5k runners and 700 10k runners all starting on the same course it was a little crowded for the first mile or so. I took this time to have a discussion on movies with my hungover friend Jordan while jogging slowly. At the end of the 1st mile, my time was around 8:50.
After this point I increased my pace a bit and kind of got in the zone. I was on cruise control into the end of the end of the 5k. At that point a man shouted to me that my time was around 24:30. I had expected to feel like "oh crap, I have to do that again?" but I felt good, and stayed the course. At around the beginning of the fifth mile, my right knee, which had been giving me trouble in the beginning of the week, locked up, along with my right calf. FML. I pushed on, albeit at a slower pace. At the beginning of the 6th mile a girl with an enormous ass passed me up, and I decided to go Kamikazee style. For the next 1.2 miles, I sprinted. I passed tons of people in this last stretch to the finish.
Results: 49.37.2 which was 12.8 seconds better than my goal of 50 minutes
Overall pace: 8:00 minutes per mile
Overall Mens 10k: 140/348
Age bracket: 11/18
Based on my final sprint at the end, I think that I did not leave it all on the course. It may have been a crazy cocktail of raceday adrenaline, potassium, endorphines and good will, but at the end of my sprint across the finish line I was not even tired, and felt as if I could have run a few more miles. I think this could be an impetus for me to run faster next time to try to shave some time off of my 10k PR, or maybe motivate me to train for a half marathon.
Following this race, we celebrated by watching the USA play Honduras in the World Cup soccer/football qualifying match at Soldier Field in Chicago. This was the first time that I had seen a professional soccer match in person, and it was very impressive. I guess it was a Saturday of firsts for me. The USA won 2-1.
