10 Mile Race - Thanksgiving

Thankfully on Thanksgiving there are various "turkey trots" to chose from.  The last number of years I have run against the turkey in the Mesa MiAmigo 10K Turkey Trot and even beat him last year (thankfully he ran slower than expected time).  This year John and I decided to run the ARR (Arizona Road Racers) 10 miler in Peoria instead because thankfully, it was closer to home.

Thankfully the race had a later start of 8am so it should have been a little warmer, right?  WRONG.  It was cold and super windy.  The jacket provided me little protection as I shook my way through line to get my race packet. Thankfully once the race started I warmed up although it took 2 miles.

John ran with me and my goal was to go out at 8:15's and see what happened.  Coming off from Ragnar just 5 days before, I didn't want to race it full out. My legs felt super heavy at the beginning and I even considered stopping because I was tired.  Thankfully at the halfway point my competitive nature kicked in and I would identify a woman in front of me, tell John...pink socks/pink shirt.... and then she was my focus.  John said I should go for the guy that was closer and my response was he's not in my age group.  My strategy worked, I thankfully passed other runners and as you can see by my splits, I thankfully got faster.

8:16
8:17
8:10
8:02
7:53
7:50
7:53
7:46
7:32
7:35


There is another reason that I wanted to take this race easy.  I've never run a 10mile race before making it an automatic PR.  So if I don't run this first one super fast, then next time I can do better and get another PR.  Thankfully my finishing time was 1:18:55/7:53 pace.
196^th out of 660

7^th out of 58 in age group

This is an out/back course and I love seeing the leaders come back through.  Sally, an elite local, was running in her signature hot pink socks and I cheered her on.  One of these days I'd like to get a picture with her but she's finishing the races so much sooner than me she's either left or doing a 10 mile cool-down by time I finish.

Post race picture (got my new Ragnar jacket on)

Happy Running! (Thankfully I'm finished with my Thanksgiving race report)