rabbit5000 Race Racap: Last Track Race of the Season

Hi Friends!

Long time, not chat. We are in full-on summer mode over here at the Floris household and it. is. wonderful! My mornings are lazy and relaxing, we grill out almost every weekend and best/cutest of all Lavinia started swim lessons!!!

A week and a half ago I ran my last track race of the season and so I thought it was about time to share a quick recap. 

I was super bummed to miss out on the inaugural rabbit5000 last year (although it was for a very, very good reason – my sister’s wedding) so when they announced the date this year and I had that weekend free I immediately signed up for the race. … and then the rest of my track season didn’t go as planned. After being sick for a MONTH, taking a week off to totally recover + reset I wasn’t sure if I was in a place where racing a 5K would be the best idea. My coach and I discussed calling my season at that point but we decided to keep training through the rabbit5000 and see where I was by the time it rolled around (about 3 weeks after that 1 week break I took). The week leading up to the race I was felling pretty good and I had had some ok workouts. I knew that I could run a decent 5K but the field was extremely elite and I didn’t think I could confidently compete with that group of ladies in the shape I was currently in. Ultimately I dropped down to the community 3K so that I could get in a quality race and then stick around and cheer on the 5K races. This was definitely the right decision as the gal that came in last in the 5K ran about the same time I did earlier this season when I was in much better shape! 

Anyhoo… onto my race! It was a super-low key, co-ed 3K (7.5 laps around the track). I did my usual pre-race warm-up routine – 2 mile jog, drills, shoe change, strides and made my way to the starting line. The other athletes and I chatted for a bit while the starter waited for the timers to be ready. 

When the timers were finally ready we were off! 

I went out a little too hard which of course caught up with me about half way through the race.

I focused on just maintaining my effort and trying to maintain a steady pace. It was more my lungs/breathing that were struggling rather than my legs which was a weird sensation because I haven’t raced while “out of shape” in a long time and it’s usually my muscles/body that are giving out when the race gets hard. I managed to come in 4th overall + 1st female with a time of 10:20. 

This is obviously really far off of where I was hoping to be at this time in the year – my original goal for this race was to PR in the 5K and be as close to 16:30 as possible. But I’m just thankful that I got one last opportunity to race and was able to experience a wonderful event put on by rabbit!

I’m also thankful (always) for my cheerleaders and #1 fans! I wouldn’t be able to train and compete like I do without their support and love!

So that’s a wrap on track season 2018 – I don’t have any races on the calendar for the summer and so training is going to be pretty laid back between now and the start of my next marathon training cycle!

All of the photos in this post from the rabbit5000 event were taken by Stephen Lewis.