Corktown 4 Mile Road Race

Corktown 4 Mile Road Race
Originally uploaded by Auberon.

Great Weather, 45 degrees at the start, 50 near the finish.

Pros: 1608 runners, many of high quality (at least 64 of them)
Cons: Pre-Parade, far too many smokers/drinkers lining the sidewalks.

My overall race strategy this time around was to go out relatively slow and try to gradually pick up my pace within my own limitations. The first mile felt GREAT! 6:24 By this time we're down far enough on Michigan Avenue that we're in the shade of the tall buildings, it got cold right there...head through campus maritius, head north on Woodward and wrap around the front of CoPa, turn back towards HockeyTown/Fox...you're at the two mile mark...if you're with me we've just crossed with a 6:24 split. Even paced, things are feeling great, nice and relaxed, just a slight bronchial cough (haven't been able to shake this thing for two months now), shake out the arms, relax and realize that the race is more than half done. LESS THAN TWO MILES TO GO......but I think I'm dropping my pace. It probably has something to do with the fact that my "pack" thinned out a lot. Quite a few people dropped off the pace, and some of them flew ahead as if to say "Sorry, you guys are far too slow for me". At this point in time I could still see Laura Murphy. She's a great local runner, who I'm sure posted a great time today. I know there was at least one more girl that seemed to be gunning after Laura. At about 2.25 miles, this young woman flew past me at what appeared to be 5:30 pace. I don't know if she ever caught her, as it seemed Laura hit the 3 mile mark and poured it on. I caught myself falling into a false sense of complacency. I apparently backed off for about 6 seconds, coming through the 3 mile mark with a split of 6:30. Normally I would have accepted 6:30 as an overall pace, but not today. I could have fallen back onto that pace and then found a way to rationalize why I did it afterwards, but today I said no, opened my stride and proceeded to finish strong. The other day I had a 4.85 mile run that ended with a 6:10 mile, so I knew that I could pull off something faster than 6:30. Going past Tigers Stadium I knew we would be running towards the old Central Station, I just didn't know how far it would be, so held off from giving it all I had for the last 400 meters. As soon as I turned the corner at 14th I could see how close the finish line was, less than 100 meters, I turned on the gas and tore up the two guys that were with me. The guy in the yellow seen in the accompanying foto had passed me at about 3.1 miles and seemed to be laboring heavily the whole way up Michigan Ave, and the guy in green shorts was running smart, letting someone in front spend all their energy pushing the pace. I've never run this race before, so I had no idea what to do, when to push, and when to let it all out. As soon as he flew past me, I knew we were close, so I caught back up to him, turned the corner, and left them in my proverbial dust. This is the first race that has truly given me confidence that I can make dramatic improvements in race times this year, AND turn in a great marathon performance come October 7th.

The final mile was 6:20....