Running With Jack

It was a warm and sunny 11C/52F as I lined up at the starting line of the 24th annual Bruchhausen Winter Streets Half-marathon. It was my second year in a row running this race, and the memory of the aching quads and hamstrings from the crowned-asphalt, two-loop race course was still fresh in my memory.

There were about 170 die-hard racers lined trying to get in one last half-marathon before the year’s end. The starting pistol interrupted mine pondering on why I was there, I could be off running on a nice trail somewhere. Well, too late, it’s time to run.

We raced through the streets of Bruchhausen, the sun was shining so there were numerous groups of people rendering their support as we ran through. I really didn’t have any time goals for this race, but on the other side I was there to give it my best so I settled into an aggressive pace, around 5:00/K (8:00/M) and worked to hold this as long as possible.

The first two kilometers were through the town, then we headed out over the fields, eventually reaching the woodline of the local forest at around the 3K/2M point. From here it was a straight shot through the woods to just after the 5K point where we turned around and ran back to the Start.

I felt pretty good the first loop, crossing the 10K point in around 50 minutes. As I started back out over the course for the second round I could feel myself slowing down – I ran the 12th kilometer in 5:30 - oops, time to put it in high gear. I managed to pick it up again for another 20-25 minutes, but then the asphalt and crowned bicycle paths started taking their toll on my quads and hamstrings, my legs tightened up and my momentum died a terrible death. The sun also hid behind the clouds and the temperature started to drop.

I really had to fight to keep my speed up over the last few kilometers. It was somewhere along here that I stopped having fun and the race became more of a quest – for what – God only knew at this point. I only knew that I had to get to the finish line as fast as I could, and with each step it seemed like someone was moving the finish line farther away.

Finally I wound my way down the last streets through town and rounded the last corner. With the finish line in sight, I did my best to sprint in and put the race behind me! I don’t recall ever having to work so hard for a 1:50:50 finish time!

This is a long ways from my personal best from this summer, but still 00:03:34 better than my time for this race last year. I figured out a long time ago that my performance declines dramatically during the winter months, so I happily except this course PR and know I probably could not have squeezed much more out of this body on this day.

The winner crossed the finish line in 1:16:42, the winning female in 1:19:06 (4th overall!), times I can only dream of. I finished 106/167 and 19/25 in my age group (M45) – I’m okay with that.

Well that was the last long race for this year. I have a 10K or two in my pocket, but just fun runs. Today I went for a nice easy 9K/5.5M recovery run, my quads were still sore, but it felt good to run without the need for speed.