Feeling Goooood

Last weekend was a great way to open up my real racing season. It was nice to be back on the roads racing 20km's. I had only done one 20km race on the roads last year and racing 50 laps on the track just isnt as fun :)

We woke up to great temperatures on race morning but the winds.....the winds were unreal! At the start of the race it was around 30mph winds. I have never raced in this bad of winds before and whenever I have trained in that wind, it has been miserable. I didnt let it bother me because being the first race of the season, time doesnt matter as much, its just about getting a good effort in. I attacked the race with Tyler Sorensen and the first lap was definitely too slow but it was really hard to tell the pace we were going with the wind and there was no km split (the laps were 1.6667km's). After the first lap (of 12) we got right onto pace of 8mins a lap. I was feeling really good and then with 4 laps to go Tyler took off from me (to chase the Olympic Trials standard of 1:36) and I tried to keep my pace from there but I started to tighten up and my last 3 laps werent so good. I lost a lot of time in those laps and my hopes of finishing in 1:36:xx wasnt going to happen. I ended up finishing in 1:37:18 which was good enough for a 4 second PB.

I am still very happy with this small personal best time because I am just glad to be back to where I was in 2009. This is still extremely early and I have barely done any workouts faster than zone #1 pace (easy pace) so I know that each race will get better and better.

Tim raced his first 50km in 4 years and it was definitely a tough day for him. Not only did he have the winds to worry about in his early stages of the race but once that died down the heat came out. By the time he was done it was 77F so thats pretty warm. He felt good through 30-35k and then Ben Shorey put a surge on and he couldnt respond and thats where Ben won the race. Tim really struggled after that and finished 2nd in a time of 4:25. After he started struggling he just needed to make sure he finished so thats what he did.

I am now in New York City getting ready to race at the Millrose Games tomorrow afternoon. I am looking to win my 3rd straight title. You can view the results after my 4:35pm race here. Wish me luck!!!

Keep on walking,

Rachel