My First Failure :'(

So I'm being melodramatic. It wasn't a failure, and I got a PR, and it's not super important.

BUT I'M SO BUMMED OUT.

Backstory:

Clarendon Day Race   is a 5k/10k double race. I thought, oh, you know I can do a 5k, and I can do a 10k. So I can do both! Besides, that, plus an additional mile back to the starting point, is about 10 miles - right where I need to be doing!

The thing was, you have to run the 5K in about 30 minutes or so, then run back to the starting line, and be ready to go at 9:05. So basically, 45 minutes to run ~4.5 miles.

To begin with , I did not have coffee this morning, did not have any sort of bread-carb (just a smoothie), and did not sleep very well. Had sushi last night (what was I thinking), and my stomach hurt.

I think you know where this is going.

BOOM - Like a crazy jack-rabbit, I go flying out of the start line, going a cool 9 minutes/mile. One mile down, feeling awesome, one and a half, feeling....meh... Two miles in...oh my god what did I do. Two and a quarter, walking. Two and a half, slow jogging. Two and three quarters, walking. Three miles, I really have to run teh rest of this.

But I was still ok, time-wise, and jogged my way back.

Up a hill worse than the Hill of Doom.

Actually, let's just be frank here, I was walking.

By the time I was almost back, the race had started, and people were jogging. By now, I was feeling just the worst, and was looking at another 6 miles.

So I did what I have been so good to not do recently - I gave up.

Here's my 5k result - a personal record of 30:07.

I've been kicking myself all day for giving up, wondering "what if I had just done x or not been so y." But, you know, this was really outside the box of anything that I have ever done before, and I am always energy conscious (trying not to do too much too fast too early). And to get a PR on a 5k is really awesome - and then to walk all the way up the hill again is pretty cool too.

Besides that, doing 10 miles today would not have been a good training exercise for my half. Quick bursts of speed are not the way (for me) to complete my race (in one week YIKES!). Slow and steady is my strategy.

So in the morning, I will drag myself out of bed for my very last "long run" prior to my half marathon, where I will run my second 10 miler (did my first last week, didn't blog about it, oh well :P).

There is a reason for everything, I guess. I'll take this as a learning experience, and do even better next year.