Race Report: Central Valley 10k

We woke up early on Saturday morning to pack up and leave our condo north of Kaanapali beach in Maui and drive to the race just outside Kahului. We found the race start with little difficulty and arrived around 6:30 a.m. to pick up our race number and t-shirt. The 10k was a small race, with probably only about 50 runners. This was the second year of the 10k race to benefit the orphaned pets of Maui at the Maui Humane Society. I'm not sure what sort of a running community they have in Maui. It seems really active from what I observed this past week. Every morning dozens of runners were out getting in their miles, but I'm not sure how many of those people were tourists or locals. It seemed like both actually. I picked up a copy of the Hawaiian Sports magazine (same as Chicago Athlete) at the Runner's Paradise store that was sponsoring the race and it looks like triathalons and biking are really popular on the islands.

The weather was nice at the start in the low 70s with some wind, but the sun was out from the beginning and that was going to have an affect later on in the race. I've never run the 10k distance as a race before so I decided to just go for it and see how well I manage. The out and back course started on a short access road to the Humane Society and then went south on a bike path towards Kihei for 3 miles. The scenery was nice, going through sugar cane fields, there was even a really nice rainbow in the distance, but I personally prefer a few more turns in a race to keep things interesting. The course seemed very flat, but it was in fact a steady downhill the first half of the race, meaning the second half of the race was a low grade hill for 3 miles.

I went out too fast on the first half of the course and paid for it later. If the race was a 5k I think I could have PR'd it easily. Unfortunately with the sun out, a strong headwind going back north, and the low grade hill going all the way back to the start I really struggled on the back half of the race. My official time hasn't been posted online yet, but based on my watch I ran the 10k in about 53:25 or something like that. Cassie came in about 2 minutes later. She ran a nice steady pace the entire race. Even though I struggled, it was a PR for me for the distance, and we had fun running a race in Hawaii on our vacation. I'm excited about the upcoming race season.

Based on this race and the 10 miler I ran last fall in North Carolina, I am not sure if I am a good middle-distance runner. I need to come up with a better race strategy for those distances. I may have to stick with the 5k and marathon as my focuses. I have two 10 mile races coming up the next month and a half, so I think I will know more about my middle-distance abilities after those.

Cassie and I are back in IL now. We had a great vacation, with lots of relaxation and fun trips all around the island of Maui. It's always good to be home though. Hopefully spring is here to stay.