Last weekend I ran and PRed in the ECSC 8k by over a minute. Even though the events afterwords were unfortunate, I still had a great race and I did want to write a recap.
The race goes along with the East Coast Surfing Championships which are held at VA Beach every August. Therefore last weekend the beach was much more crowded and parking was a lot harder to come by. After finally finding a garage to park in, I was able to get my standard 2 mile warmup.
It was a smaller race start then I’m used too and didn’t see a lot of my friends there. I tried to line up pretty close to the start since it wasn’t a mat start either. Once we actually started I got into my normal groove. I didn’t feel awesome but I didn’t feel awful either.
For the first mile I was caught up in the crowd. There were a lot of people who took it out extremely fast and I had them pushing me. The course was a straight flat road down and back. There are no hills at VA Beach and the only turn was the turn coming back. There was a lot of wind in one direction though. During the first mile I was second female overall. (5:48)
I was about 50 feet behind the first female so I really locked her into my sights and tried to push to catch her. We ended up running the second mile together. During the second mile, a van backed onto the race course but luckily for us they were a bit further away so it didn’t interfere. Mile 2 was a little bit of a blur (6:25).
The third mile included a round about turn and onto the boardwalk. By this point, I had tried to pick it up. Since we were going the opposite direction the wind was at our back. I turned to the person next to me and said it should be pretty quick for the second half and it was like instanegative split. A lot of the ECSC surfers were out cheering which made it pretty cool (6:16).
Mile 4, I started to just feel dead and was trying to hang on for dear life. It was a pretty hard mile for me. Since I’m not used to racing 8ks (I’ve done 3), it just felt like an extended 5k. Two extra bonus miles (6:13).
There were a lot of tourists on the boardwalk for the last mile but I was able to get by them without any falls. During the last mile, I had felt the other female behind me and she was gaining. I tried to pick it up too but it was extremely painful. I was really giving this race everything I had. I really wanted to hold on for dear life and moved my legs as fast as they would go. I knew I wasn’t going to have a good kick if it came down to the last 100 meters. I barely stayed in front of her but if the race had been another .100 meters (If that) I can almost guarantee you she would have passed me (6:03).
Final thoughts on the race:
I honestly don’t know. This was a great race for me but I don’t have a lot of positive or negative thoughts about the race itself. I raced my hardest and PRed. It was a completely flat and fast course (not counting the wind).
Questions for you:
Have you ever been surfing?
What is your least favorite aspect of a course? (if it’s hilly, lots of turns …ect).