Sacramento Zoo Zoom 5K

Today I took on the Sacramento Zoo Zoom 5K. I have ran the Zoo Zoom twice in the past, but both of those times I ran the 10K. In both of those races, I set a new 10K PR, and I was looking forward to setting a new 5K PR, and in particular, was aiming to set my 5K PR below 24 minutes. I got close to 24 minutes three week ago at the Running of the Elk Thrive 5K and hoped that I could improve my performance enough to break through. The Zoo Zoom is a flat, fast course but so was the course for the Elk Thrive 5K.

The race got started on time, and I got off to a good start. There were quite a few faster runners ahead of me at the start, but I did a good job of not going too hard in the first couple minutes. I maintained a good pace throughout the first mile and completed it in 7:38. The second mile was as good (even better) than the first, and I finished it in 7:35. Generally when my second mile is faster than the first, it's a sign that I'm going to have a really good run.

That, however, was not necessarily the case today. Shortly int the third mile, I started to feel a bit off. The best way that I can explain it is that my body started to feel as if I was being lightly shocked. Not sure if it was related to the weather or if it was related to my race day breakfast, but whatever it was, it made the last mile quite difficult. I kept pushing, but I noticed that my pace had dropped a half minute per mile. I knew that I had created a buffer for the final mile since my first two were so fast, but it was going to be tight if I didn't pick up my pace a little bit.

After a few minutes, I was able to pick it up a bit, but I knew things were still going to be tight. When I hit the 3 mile mark, I was glad to almost be done and gave the run everything I had left. As I approached the line, I could see the race timer was at 23:50. As I pushed through the line, I was pretty sure that I crossed before the clock hit 24 minutes, and even if not, I ought to have a second or two buffer based on how long it took me to get to the start line.

It took a few hours before results were posted online, but once they were, I was glad to see that I indeed did meet my goal (and with six seconds to spare):

My final mile clocked in at 7:58 which was enough to get it done but quite a bit off from my pace in the previous miles.

Now that I've broken through 24 minutes, I'm not sure what's next race-wise. Would be nice to lower my 5K PR even more and perhaps get close to 8 MPH (23:15), but I'd also like to get back to running 10Ks. If I focus on training for a month, I should be at the point that I can take on my first 10K of the year. I'll have to give it some thought over the next few days.