On a whim, I signed up for the Fall Classic 10km on Friday.  I briefly contemplated running the half; however,  memories of a past half marathon on this course, and the fact I have run nothing longer than 12km since mid October, led me to believe anything longer than 10km would be a bad idea.

It was freezing.  And snowing. And I saw runners wearing singlets and shorts.  singlets  + shorts + 0 degrees weather = super fast runners.  We were warned at the start that today was a bad idea to try and pb.  Of course, that never stops anyone from trying.

The first km split = 4:36k which was definitely faster than I wanted to go out today.  So I slowed down.  Somewhere between 2km and 3km there was a hill, I hadn’t counted on hills.  Thankfully, it was the only hill we encountered.

Throughout the race I kept reminding myself that I wasn’t running anyone’s race but my own.  I let runners pass me in the first few kilometers and resisted the urge to chase them down, reminding myself there was still plenty of race to run. I found my pace, counted km markers, my mind filled with vague thoughts of “Gee, a 10km race is harder to run than I thought it would be.”

Pretty much ran the whole thing but at 9km I caved, walked for like 15 seconds, then made myself run again.  I could tell myself it was because of the ice, but it wasn’t really.  But I guess I did have gas left in the tank because  I sprinted the last few hundred meters to the finish line.  That definitely felt good.

Today’s course was definitely not as fun to run as Summerfast but given the conditions and the amount of ummm training (or lack thereof)  in the last month, I was happy with my time.   I managed a 49:01, second best time.   And just maybe, I found little bit of redemption in this race….