Ithaca 5 & 10

Today I ran the 10-mile part of the Ithaca 5 & 10. The 5-mile course was a loop and people running the 10-miler had to run the loop twice. The 10-mile race only attracted 85 people this year (read this article from the Ithaca Journal) and I am slow so, yes, I was lapped by a few people. And I came in 85th with a time of 1:54:56. I averaged an 11:29 pace and finished 9th out of 9 in my age group.

Here I am with Larsson and Nora before the race started:


I ran the race with a few people from Team in Training including Harland--one of the coaches--and Amy and Yassine, my teammates. Actually, I should say that we all participated in the race since I ran mostly by myself until the end when Harland came to find me and ran with me for the final half mile or so.



Running ten miles alone is pretty boring and I regretted not bringing my audiobook. Oh well.

The course started at Ithaca High School and then went through sections of downtown and Stewart Park. Running a loop two times is not my favorite thing to do because, when I'm running the loop the first time, I keep thinking that I'm just going to have to run the whole thing again. But at least when I start the second time, I'm familiar with the course and know in my mind how much is left until the end.

Since I hadn't run in a week, I wasn't sure how my foot was going to feel and I was a little nervous. The race began, I started to run and my foot was uncomfortable right off and then began to get worse. I tried to alter my gait and then run on the side of my foot to alleviate some of the discomfort. After about 5 miles, my foot started to feel better. It was still a little sore but I could run on it with no real problem. It became more sore after I stopped running but it was nothing like last weekend when I couldn't walk on it at all so, overall, I am very encouraged.

Here I am with the kids at the finish line after the race ended:


And here we are walking together back to the car:


Based on today's experience, we are still planning on going to Philadelphia this weekend for the half-marathon and I am looking forward to it. There are supposed to be about 10,000 runners there so I shouldn't be last.