For the past few years, our family has participated in the Pittsburgh Turkey Trot 5K race on Thanksgiving Day morning.  Unfortunately, the race was cancelled this year, because of the pandemic.  There was the option to do a virtual version of the race, but we decided not to do that.

Instead of running on Thanksgiving Day therefore, I chose to take a rest day, and to spend a great day with my family.  This meant that yesterday morning, I woke up very refreshed.  I made the decision that I would go run a 5K on my own and also decided, I would run it as fast as possible.  Could I run a PR?  That was in my mind, but I had no idea if I could.

I drove to the local High School to do my run.  This location meant I would be able to run free of worrying about traffic and also, I knew the route around the school perimeter, was reasonably flat.  I had on my Asics Metaracer race shoes, and because the weather was quite mild, I was able to run in a short sleeved shirt and shorts.

When trying to run a fast 5K, it is critical to warm up appropriately before the ‘race’.  My warm up consisted of a ten minute build run, where I ended up at tempo pace, followed by five, 15 second sprints with 45 seconds of easy pace recovery.  I then walked for a few minutes before starting the 5K run.

All 5K races are tough for me, because right from the start, you go fast.  I started running at a pace that I felt that I could just about hold for the next three miles.  I was running at about 85-90% of maximum effort from the start.  My plan was to hold this pace for two miles, and then try to gradually increase it, hopefully holding on until the run was over.

I executed the run perfectly.  My first mile was the slowest, the second mile was only a single second faster, but I was able to go ten seconds quicker per mile to the end.  The result…. a PR!! 

I ran this 5K a whopping 45 seconds quicker, than I had ever run a 5K before.  That doesn’t sound like a lot, until you realize that is 15 seconds per mile faster than my previous best.  I won’t share the time here, but it’s out there on my Strava account, if you want to go look it up.

I was so happy with how the run went.  It was a reflection of all the hard work, that I have put in this year.  I find it hard to believe that at 58 years old, I am still getting faster, but I am.  For that I am very thankful.