Prosperity's Hoppin' 5K Race Report

This was a morning race out of town, and since we didn't travel, it meant getting up at 5:30 this morning. My training didn't go too well in the last two weeks: busy schedule, and we MOVED two weeks ago (how did I not think of that when I signed up for this race?). I skipped some important training runs, I had low weekly mileage, and I didn't get nearly enough sleep and nutrition. I didn't feel in great form, so I didn't have high hopes for the race, still, I just *had to* aim for 21 minutes.

I got to Prosperity (SC) a bit late: it was 7:40 when I parked my car, and the 5K was supposed to start at 8:00. By the time I picked up my packet and pinned on my bib, it was almost too late to start to warm up. I had a nervous warm up with a bathroom break and I found myself mentally unprepared at the start line. This was a small local race and I knew many of the runners, so I knew how to line up.

Before I knew we were running. Except for a few local young kinds, who went out way too fast, the field got arranged into a stable configuration. I picked a small group for pacing myself of them. Soon they slimmed to two people: a young kid, and a woman about my age (33). I was OK for the first mile, but my legs were just not perfect. I passed a guy who slowed down, and maybe another few runners, still following my "pacing group" at a distance of five to ten meters. It was a challenge to keep up with them, but it was doable: this suggested that their pace was perfect.

Prosperity is lovely little town, and it is little all right: we had to run back and forth to do 5 kilometers within the town. At one point, we ran a stretch backwards, where some folks were still coming in the opposite direction. We passed the 2.5 kilometers sign (apart from this one, there were signs for 4 km, and 4.5 km only), my time was exactly 10:30, which was giving me some hope.

My pacing group of two broke up, but they were still very close to each other, so I didn't have to
chose which one of them to follow until the 4 km mark, when I passed the kid and followed the woman. Unfortunately the kilometer markers were not very useful to me in terms of pacing.

We turned to the finish hill. Indeed, the finish line was on the top of the hill, the same hill that had the start line at its bottom! It wasn't a very long hill, though. A kid passed me up the hill, but then he slowed down (quite annoying), so I almost passed him back, but then he went elbow to elbow with me at the very narrow finish line. I let him go first: I didn't care too much about position, and he was clearly not in my age group. I also saw on the finish clock that I won't even PR here. My time was 21:28, 11 seconds off my PR and a disappointing 28 seconds off my goal.

I'm not sure what went wrong in the second half of the race. I didn't feel I was slowing down; or if I did, so did the other runners. I actually passed people. The hilltop finish certainly accounts for a few seconds, but it shouldn't be 28! Maybe the course was long, but it was USATF certified (a runner with Garmin said it was about 3.2 miles). Anyway, with the expectations I had, it still isn't too bad.

Especially because the field was small (86 runners), so I had a nice surprise: I won my age group. I received a nice medal. I wish I really deserved it with a sub-21 time, but I'll try to make good on it next year.