For my third and final (thank God!) race of the week, I journeyed on over to Fletcher’s Cove to celebrate the 41st anniversary of the DC Road Runners Club (and to race four miles).

I didn’t really have a goal for the race, but I had predicted a time of around 26:00. Oddly, this was the third longest race I have ever run (behind the Chicago Half and an 8k I did in high school). It was clear I have a fair amount of speed right now, but my endurance needs some serious work. I crossed the halfway point at 12:41, feeling as if I had very little left. My second half, 13:21, proves I was right. I actually felt the point at which my core gave out and my form went to poo; time to do some serious abs and upper body work. Overall, I’m quite pleased with the 26:02 (6:30.5 per mile); pre-race I had serious doubts about my 26 minute predicition, but that is close enough for a third race of the week, on dirt/sand/gravel (traction was a SERIOUS problem, efficiency was way down), and for a distance that I really haven’t been training for (haven’t been doing long runs once a week, and my typical longest is four to five).

This week I’ll be developing my marathon training plan, but not starting it; the weekend brings along the 12 Hours of Cranky Monkey mountain bike relay race, so I’ll not be running after Wednesday. I’ll also be putting up a “race” section as noted earlier this week (will take 15 minutes, which I haven’t found yet).

Note: A big congratulations to Ms. Caitlin for attending the race on no training, finishing in 29:35, and winning her age group. She doubted her ability all week, but I knew she had a base level of lung performance that would allow her to run that quickly on very little training. She has a nifty little DCRRC duffle/running bag to show for her efforts. She also really enjoyed the post-race cake and watermelon