Tulsa Run 15k

Saturday was the Tulsa Run. My mom ran the 5k at 7:50 am and Ty and I ran the 15k at 9 am. Looking at event details the day before I saw their post-race party included a kids' area with inflatables, face painting, and balloon animals. I knew Carter and Elise would love that. I also knew the race is huge, one of the largest in the state, and it may be crazy crowded so I was afraid the lines for everything would be really long. The kids were still asleep when it was time for mom to leave for her race so we let them sleep and Ty dropped mom off at the race start and came back home. We got ready once they woke up and hoped to make it there in time to see mom finish but with parking, paying to park, and walking to the start area we didn't make it in time. I took off to run a mile warm-up and Ty found mom to pass the kids off to her. When I got back from running my warm-up I found mom with the kids. She told me good luck, I kissed the kids, and then they headed up a ways so they could get a good spot to see us go by. The announcer started talking about the race starting in a few minutes and then I looked down at my watch to see it was 8:49 and panicked thinking the race started at 8:50 so I skipped the porta potties and headed into the start corral. It wasn't until I was in the corral stretching that I remembered the race started at 9 and he must've been talking about the start to the masters race.

Me with the kids before the race.

My goal going into the race was to run around 7 minute pace. I told Ty I figured I could finish somewhere between 1:04 and 1:06. I figured finishing in an hour and four minutes would be a great race with perfect conditions. Once I took a look at the elevation map I figured 1:04 wouldn't be happening and I would be doing good if I could hit 7 minute pace for the race. At the expo the night before as we were picking up our packets I struck up a conversation with the guys working the information table while Carter was looking at something with Ty and my mom. He said the race barely met certification standards to be a USATF certified course due to the amount of elevation gain in the last mile. I had noticed that the last mile of the race appeared to be nearly all uphill while looking at the elevation chart. A man walked up and overheard my conversation with the information table and said he had run the race before and considered it very hilly. At that point I figured my finishing time would be more around 1:06. The elevation map showed a decent amount of downhill in the first mile so I knew my first mile would most likely be fast and I was prepared to not worry if my first mile split seemed way too fast. There seemed to be about an equal amount of downhills and uphills so I knew I'd make up some of the time lost on uphills with the downhills. But I also knew the last mile was going to be rough. The last kilometer of the Zoo Run 10k had a couple small hills and they killed me after running hard for so many miles. I knew having a decent number of hills in the last mile of a 15k was going to hurt.

Here's a course map with the elevation chart on the bottom in reddish pink.

We took off at the start and I was watching for mom and the kids. I saw them to the right of the course so I veered out and over toward them, waving at Carter and Elise who were so excited to see me. The first mile felt great although it did have quite a few downhill sections. We hit our first hill right before the mile mark and made it to the top of the hill right as my watch beeped for my first mile split of 6:43. I knew that would most likely be my fastest mile of the race since it was the mile with the fewest uphills and the most down hill sections. I felt like I maintained pace through the 2nd mile and went through it in 7:05. Mile 3 had fewer hills and I was again under pace with a 6:46 mile. It was around this point in the race where we did an out and back on Peoria Street. We could see the people ahead of us running back on the road. I saw the woman I ran with at the Zoo Run 10k way ahead of me and thought she was either having a crazy good race or I was running terribly. Then a while down the road I realized she must have been running the masters race and started 10 minutes before me. We hit a hill we run during the St. Patty's Day 5k and I chuckled to myself thinking back to how much I was hurting on the hill during that race and was having no trouble with it during this race as all the earlier hills had been much tougher and I was still cruising along at a comfortably hard pace. Once I hit the turn around on the road I started scanning the other side for Ty. It was nice thinking about seeing him and got me excited for that mile. I saw him and high fived him right around the 4th mile mark which I ran in 7:00. Around that time I pulled my Gu out of my shorts and started slowly eating it. I finished it right as my watch beeped for my 5th mile in 7:04.

A picture mom got of me at the start of the race. You can see me all the way to the left of the picture.

At that point the race seemed to have thinned out a bit. I guess because some people were falling off pace. I got a bit more pep in my step after eating the Gu. I had only eaten a graham cracker before the race and probably needed something in my belly at that point. I started passing the people around me and was running along with a guy wearing a fuel belt who I had seen off and on for most of the race. We were coming up on Riverside where I knew we would run across the river on a bridge and then have a few flatter miles. I went through mile 6 in 6:49. When I hit the 10k mark there was a clock next to the mat and I was impressed to see I ran the 10k in 43:20. Last year at the Sweetheart Run I ran a 43:11 and felt like I had a pretty good race. It was awesome to see I was able to run close to that time for the first 10k of my 15k race. I passed the guy with the fuel belt around this time and was sad because I only had a few people running along a ways ahead of me. Once we hit the bridge we were running into the wind which I hadn't noticed too much up until that point in the race but it was really gusting. I could see three women running ahead of me. Two were fairly close and the third had a decent sized gap on me. I started focusing on reeling them in. I caught the first one on the bridge and passed the second one shortly after. Mile 7 was 6:55. As I went into the last two miles I was starting to feel tired and was feeling a bit wary of hitting that last mile worth of hills. I was contemplating whether I should give mile 8 hell and try to pick up some time to give me more of a cushion going into the last mile or if I should hold back to give myself more energy going into the last mile. Ultimately I decided to just run that mile like the last mile wasn't hilly and then try to power through the last mile as much as I could. Mile 8 was 6:51. I really felt like I could have maintained 6:50 pace if the course hadn't been so hilly. I would run in the 6:40's during miles with significant downhills and then in the 7:00's during miles with significant uphills. Then the flatter miles were all around 6:50. Going into the last mile I had caught up to the woman I had seen running a ways ahead of me and was surprised to see she was running in what appeared to be an army dress Halloween costume. I felt hot just looking at her and was impressed she was running as well as she was. As I had expected the last mile was rough. I kept trying to push up the hills but my legs were just dead. I told myself if I could hold onto 7:15 for that last mile I'd be doing good and kept repeating 7:15 in my head but I just couldn't quite do it, running mile 9 in 7:23. I was able to push the pace down a bit for the last 0.38 mile with a 7:05 pace. Even the last straight away to the finish was uphill! Approaching the finish line I could see the clock and knew I was going to finish just over 1:05.

The finish line chute was set up so you walked quite a ways picking up your free goodies. I made it through with my medal, a small hand towel, a Snicker's bar, a banana, water, Muscle Milk, and a box lunch from McAlister's Deli. The awesome people from Reasor's who were handing out bananas and candy bars gave me a sack to put all my loot in. I then walked to the post-race party looking for the inflatables because I figured that's where I would find mom with the kids. I didn't see the inflatables so I started walking back up to the finish line and found them on a side street. Mom and the kids weren't there so I decided to walk back up along the course. Not much into my walk I bumped into mom, Carter, and Elise. They had walked probably at least 2 miles to Veteran's Park hoping to see us there. They arrived as the 7:30 pace group went by so mom knew she missed me and headed back to the finish area. I walked them to the kids' area and then took off on my cool down back out on the course to run to the finish with Ty. I made it to him about 3/4 of a mile from the finish at the last water stop. He walked through the water stop and we chatted a little. Then when he was ready to run again he put his headphones back in and we started running. When we made it to the finishing stretch with the fence up along the street I went to the sidewalk to run along the finish by him. There was an area that was under construction so I had to go around the block and missed Ty's finish. I kept going to finish out to a 2 mile cool down and then found mom and the kids before going back to look for Ty. We stayed in the kids' area for quite a while. Carter had a blast on the inflatables, got a balloon dog which popped, then a balloon snake, and both kids got their faces painted. It was such a fun morning and I had a blast during the race.

Elise getting her face painted.

Carter getting his face painted.

My time of 1:05:19 for 9.38 miles was 6:58 pace. I really feel like with a taper going into the half marathon and an awesome race I could possibly run that pace during my half marathon. The half marathon course has the same amount of elevation gain during the race as the 15k did but since it is a longer distance, it is more spread out and the last mile isn't so challenging. My time put me 3rd out of 306 in my age group, 15th out of 1,959 female finishers, and 113th out of 3,573 total finishers. Since I was able to run the race in under 70 minutes I got a special cup which I forgot to pick up but will be able to get at the race expo for the half marathon. Going into the race I was hoping to run all my 5k splits fairly consistently and hoped for them all to be right around 22 minutes. With the significant downhills in the first 5k and the significant uphills in the last 5k I knew I wouldn't be able to negative split and wouldn't be too consistent. I was really proud that my first 5k split was 21:34, my 2nd was 21:46, and my last was 21:59. I felt like given the difference in difficulty of those sections of the course, that was pretty darn good! Ty finished in 1:38:24 which put him 138th out of 196 in his age group and 1,803rd overall. Mom finished the 5k in 34:47 and said the 5k course was also quite hilly. She was 20th out of 76 in her age group and 790th out of 1,772 total finishers. Up next for me is the Jenks 5k Saturday morning followed by the Wicked Wine Run in the evening. I'm excited to attempt a fast 5k in the morning and then have some fun with friends in the evening!