IMP 5K (3 mile?) Race

I ran the annual Illini Mentor Program (IMP) 5K race this past weekend on the University of Illinois quad. (Quad photo on left.) Finished in 20:05. Good enough for 4th overall and 1st in age group (50-59). I felt OK with that finish. Great speed work out! My Garmin watch said it's really more like 3 miles than 3.1 miles (5km). It's organized by a student group--guess you can't expect perfection. At least it was well-marked with course marshals and had good finish line food. Pretty campus too. Awards took a long time to be announced, but the day was warm and sunny so it was fine hanging out chatting with fellow runners. I'll do it again next year. Maybe it'll be a full 5km race. Another thing I love about this race? It's only ONE BLOCK from my office on campus! Sure makes pre and post-race tasks easy and stress-free.

Thoughts on this race and my performance? Running on a university quad is hard--literally (concrete sidewalks) with many sharp turns. And you need to do three loops to get the full distance so you lap other runners/walkers, plus weave in and out of students that were just walking around the Quad. This wasn't a big race, so not a big deal. I would have preferred cooler weather (it was 65-68F). Overall, I should have pushed a bit harder. After all, this was a race. Based on heart rate data, I basically used this is a tough tempo run. HR max=176, HR avg=169.

I did tell the race organizers that you should NOT have the starting line 20 feet from a 90 degree turn! Just start on a straight section of sidewalk. Hopefully wide sidewalk. I almost trampled a couple of young kids on that quick, sharp turn at the start.

My next race is Allerton Park trail race on October 29 (6 days to go), then the Indianapolis Monumental Half-marathon one week later. That will make 4 races in 5 weeks. Good stuff.