Friday, November 14, 2014

Race Recap: EQT Pittsburgh 10 Miler

I remember seeing the information for this race last year and I wanted to do it but honestly, it scared me.  I'm not quite sure why, because at that time, I was in training for my first half marathon.  I didn't do it and I went on with life.

Fast forward to this year.  At the beginning of 2014, I decided that I wanted to do more races.  I wanted to do different distances, I wanted to just do more.  I have achieved that and one of the new race distances I tried was this ten miler!

I had been thinking about it but I wasn't sure because I had my half marathon 22 days before the ten miler.  I wasn't sure if I could turn around and do another long distance run that soon.  I decided to sign up and go for it.  Why not?!

After my half marathon, I didn't run much.  In fact, it took me nine days to get out and run and even when I did, it wasn't easy.  I did five miles and it took me much longer and it was much harder than before. I decided that as long as I kept consistent with doing at least 3-4 miles, 3 days a week, I could do this.   I didn't do that.  The days were busy and they passed quickly.  I ran 8 miles a week before the race to make sure I could handle the long distance. However, even when I did that, I was doing run/walk intervals.

I went into the race with no real plan of action.  I had no idea if I was going to do intervals or if I was going to attempt to run the whole thing.  I had a friend that I was running with so she really pushed me.

We started out with a plan to run at a 10:30-11:00minute/mile pace to keep us consistent throughout the entire run. We started out faster than that. For the first five miles, we were running a bit faster than that pace but we felt good.  We decided to just go with it and base our run off of how we felt.  She pushed us along and we were feeling good. It was probably pretty aggressive for me and I started to feel tired around mile 6 but I wasn't going to give in.  I couldn't.  My friend wasn't about to let me stop.  She was so good and kept saying, "we got this, you CAN do this!"  Did I mention that she is 13 years older than me and a real powerhouse?!

Around mile 8-9, she wanted to bump up the speed for a quicker finish.  I just couldn't and I started to fall a bit behind. I started to feel a pain in the middle of my foot and I wasn't about to push it and injure myself.  I was able to take a walk break and get going again for a good finish.  It was a wonderful race and I do plan on doing it again next year.  I hope to get more ladies to run it and do a group run.  It was great to have the experience of running that distance with a friend.

Here is a link to my official photos, I LOVE them but they charge so much for them and I just can't justify buying them. :(

This race has me excited for the Pittsburgh Half Marathon where I will get to see even more of the city on foot.  The city is such a spectacular sight to see.

Here are my EQT Pittsburgh 10 Miler stats:
Finish Time: 1:46:56
Pace: 10:41min/mile
#1691 of 2395 women
#3241 overall
#291 of 424 in my age group

Not too shabby if I do say so myself!

Here's a few of my favorite pics:



Sorry about the quality, I couldn't screenshot them or get them clear on my phone so I am stuck with pictures of the computer monitor! haha.