Yesterday I ran my fastest 5k. I am still getting over the sting of being in the 45-49 age bracket, it really doesn’t seem possible. At least I can take solace in the fact that I did indeed, run my fastest 5k. As soon as the throng of humanity is released at the start line, I take off. Maybe not as fast as some, but much faster than I would ever run on my own.
I will preface by acknowledging that a 24 minute 5k is not an impressive feat for many people. People like the rest of my family. My 12 year old ran a sub 21 minute race, the rest of them were even faster. For me, a woman of experience and wisdom, a sub 25 min 5k seemed impossible 2 years ago so to set a goal of sub 24 was like auditioning for Star Search! Dare to dream!
This winter, I took a break from races. I started feeling my wanna-be next hammer-toe start aching after my Christmas Town Dash 8k in December and decided to give myself a break. I still ran, but tried to find the warmest part of the day and took it pretty easy. I’ve picked it up slightly in the past month, averaging around 15 miles a week at a comfortable pace. Speed has not been my focus. I was apprehensive going into this 5K as my “comfortable” pace is easily 1 minute to a minute and a half slower than my last 5K pace. Towards the end of last year, I wanted to break the 24 minute mark for a 5K, I was somewhere around a 24:20 in my best race.
Yesterday, I ran a 24:04. I did not meet my goal of being sub 24 but now I really believe that it is possible. Sometimes we need to rethink the purpose of a goal. It’s not a failure if we don’t meet the goal, it’s a failure if we don’t give it our best shot.
If I can keep getting faster, despite my advancing years, I am inspired to think of all of the other things I can get better at. Or learn. We are never too old to learn new tricks!
So why is it that I run so much faster in a race? Am I just a lazy runner the rest of the time? I am assuming that adreneline has a lot to do with it. Running 5-6 miles vs 3.1 could help as well. Either way, I don’t particularly enjoy running fast so it would be difficult to force myself to run at race pace when I am not being pursued by my rivals.
Two things I am loving right now. My shoes and my socks! I am on the second exact pair of these Topos, they have a wide toe box, zero drop and they look nice! Unlike many wide toe-box shoes, you won’t look like you stole the bowling alley rejects.
I find that my socks make a huge difference, I tend to get large callous build up near my bunions and my little toe gets rubbed my any seams. I found these oddly named, Thirty48 socks. The ones I tried are ankle cut compression socks with a tab back. These socks are made for left and right feet specifically. I found they greatly reduced the friction I had been experiencing. If you have bunions and like a zero drop, try these shoes!
I like these socks so much that I have been hand washing them. Really my only reason for doing so is that I will never remember to keep them out of the dryer! I don’t want them to shrink! This is a huge commitment from me, I don’t own anything that is hand wash only and have never taken anything to the dry cleaner. These socks are worth it! These are best socks I have found for running with bunions!
