Sunday, October 29, 2006
Now, walk it out.
Pac 10's, Baby! Lets have fun with this.
-Coach
Yesterday, the team was up in Palo Alto, Ca on the Farm to run the Pac 10 Championships hosted by Stanford. I have always enjoyed running in Palo Alto and have had moderate success on the Stanford golf course (my team won the Stanford Invite my junior year of HS). I can see why Palo Alto is a training hotbed as, every time I have visited, the weather has been absolutely perfect. Yesterday was no exception with sunny skies and temps in the mid 60's at the start of the race.
Seeing as this was my first Pac 10 cross country race, I was pretty excited to get out and compete. Coming into the race, I wanted to be more aggressive than Pre Nats were I went out very conservatively and more than likely paid for it, place wise at least. So, my strategy for Pac 10s was to just go out hard and hang on.
The first mile passed in about 4:38 and, surprisingly, I felt quite comfortable. However, I knew that today was business when, on the gradual downhills on the course, I was basically sprinting to keep pace with the pack. Although, despite the variable paces during the race, I was able to keep focused and hang on for the ride.
At 4k, I realized that today was going to be a good one for me when I felt great and when I realized I was running with our number 5. Eric usually wastes me at races so running with him really boosted my confidence.
I passed 5k in 15:24 or so and still felt strong. However, at 6.5k, I started to waver a little and slow down. For some reason, I always lose focus at this point in the race. I think, for next time, I am just going to surge as, taking advice from the great Jack Daniels, when you are uncomfortable in a race, just run harder and good things usually happen.
As I passed the 7k, I was feeling it pretty good and knew that if I ran at least a 3:17, I would break 25:00 for 8k. Subconsciously, this was great motivation to really hit it hard the last segment of the race. But, in reality, I really wanted to run down the Stanford and Oregon guy in front of me.
When I approached the last 400 meters of the race, I knew that I could gun down those guys and I succeeded while crossing the finish line in 24:48.
I need to work on my arm drive and getting my head up
The team finished 3rd after an unfortunate mishap on the final straight of the race. Our number 3 apparently walked across the finish line in exhaustion and had to be treated after the race by medical personnel. Overall, I was happy with how the team ran. Kenny really stepped it up and ran a huge PR but we are still lacking in a few areas. Although, we have 2 weeks to straighten things out before Regionals in Portland.
On a note unrelated to running, if you wish to make it to your sisters wedding on time and are leaving from the San Jose area, DO NOT fly Delta airlines. They will make you miss your flight and force you to stay in SLC for no reason at all.
-Coach
Yesterday, the team was up in Palo Alto, Ca on the Farm to run the Pac 10 Championships hosted by Stanford. I have always enjoyed running in Palo Alto and have had moderate success on the Stanford golf course (my team won the Stanford Invite my junior year of HS). I can see why Palo Alto is a training hotbed as, every time I have visited, the weather has been absolutely perfect. Yesterday was no exception with sunny skies and temps in the mid 60's at the start of the race.
Seeing as this was my first Pac 10 cross country race, I was pretty excited to get out and compete. Coming into the race, I wanted to be more aggressive than Pre Nats were I went out very conservatively and more than likely paid for it, place wise at least. So, my strategy for Pac 10s was to just go out hard and hang on.
The first mile passed in about 4:38 and, surprisingly, I felt quite comfortable. However, I knew that today was business when, on the gradual downhills on the course, I was basically sprinting to keep pace with the pack. Although, despite the variable paces during the race, I was able to keep focused and hang on for the ride.
At 4k, I realized that today was going to be a good one for me when I felt great and when I realized I was running with our number 5. Eric usually wastes me at races so running with him really boosted my confidence.
I passed 5k in 15:24 or so and still felt strong. However, at 6.5k, I started to waver a little and slow down. For some reason, I always lose focus at this point in the race. I think, for next time, I am just going to surge as, taking advice from the great Jack Daniels, when you are uncomfortable in a race, just run harder and good things usually happen.
As I passed the 7k, I was feeling it pretty good and knew that if I ran at least a 3:17, I would break 25:00 for 8k. Subconsciously, this was great motivation to really hit it hard the last segment of the race. But, in reality, I really wanted to run down the Stanford and Oregon guy in front of me.
When I approached the last 400 meters of the race, I knew that I could gun down those guys and I succeeded while crossing the finish line in 24:48.
I need to work on my arm drive and getting my head up
The team finished 3rd after an unfortunate mishap on the final straight of the race. Our number 3 apparently walked across the finish line in exhaustion and had to be treated after the race by medical personnel. Overall, I was happy with how the team ran. Kenny really stepped it up and ran a huge PR but we are still lacking in a few areas. Although, we have 2 weeks to straighten things out before Regionals in Portland.
On a note unrelated to running, if you wish to make it to your sisters wedding on time and are leaving from the San Jose area, DO NOT fly Delta airlines. They will make you miss your flight and force you to stay in SLC for no reason at all.
