Short version:
10k race-48:06 (pervious PB was 50:49)
2nd in my AG (46-54). Weird age groupings.
8/70 women
25/134 overall
I decided a few weeks ago to run this 10k race. It was put on my our local college and started at the main entrance of the college. They had 3k and 5k events also. About 938 people in all three events, so quite a small race. I hadn't really worked on any speed since I'm training for my first 50k race and wanted to make sure my endurance was there, so didn't really know what to expect. I had run most of this course as part of my long runs a couple of times, so I knew there wasn't any monster hills, but it was never flat. Rolling ups and downs the whole way. My plan was to use gravity when I could and push when I had to.
Woke up to 1C, 50kph winds and threat of rain. Just as we were leaving it started to snow! I opted to go with capris, long sleeve shirt and RM short sleeve shirt over that and gloves. I was debating about a toque, but in the end wore my RM hat, which I was thankful for because it kept the rain/sleet out of my eyes.
We started right in front of the main doors of the college and went for about 400m around the grounds, then headed up a pathway to get to the overpass over the Trans-Canada highway, once over the overpass, it was downhill to the main pathway on top of the coulee that we would follow. At the bottom of this set of coulees are two golf courses and amazingly enough I did spot a couple of golfers on this cold morning. We zigzagged around the coulee, all the while going up or down with a few good down slopes that I knew we needed to go back up on the way back. By about 3k we had all settled into our "place" and stayed there until about 6k. At the turn around point I counted the women ahead of me and I thought it was about 11, and I knew for sure one was in my AG. As soon as we turned the wind and rain became the factor, because up until this point it was mostly at our backs. Now the real work began.
I started to think about passing the people that went out too fast. First, I had been leap frogging with this guy who would blow by me on the downhill, but I always caught up and passed him on the uphills. A nice uphill is coming, OK, time to leave you behind-bu-bye. Next was a lady in a bright pink jacket, it took me about 1/2k to catch her, but once again I passed her on the uphill. She heard me coming and looked back and commented that I had some "kick". See ya! Next was a high school teenager (he had his track shirt on) and I thought he was going to stay with me, but I managed to stay in front and he finally gave in. Two more ladies (girls) on the last short (steep) uphill. I passed one more gentleman, and just couldn't catch the next two that were about 200m in front of me. By this time I was at about 9k and just wanted it to be over, so I pushed as hard as my legs would allow on a nice downhill slope (coming off the overpass over the highway). Turn left into the college grounds, I can see the clock, it's says 47:xx, push, push, run hard. Crossed the line at 48:06 (chip time).
Super happy with this time.
After thoughts:
All the times I've whined in my journal about running uphill against the wind at the end of my runs certainly paid off today.
I ran a controlled fairly even pace (for me)
It was so nice to be in a warm building before and after, with real flush toilets.
I was so happy to see my parents cheering me at the 1k mark.
It was great to have K and Steve cheering at the end. Steve almost missed getting a picture of me as he said he wasn't expecting me so soon.
Good thing I love him or he'd be in trouble for that comment. 
