Cowyell 5000m track race with Running Friends

Jack, Daniel, Jay, me and Shawn

In the Running Friends group, we have 7-8 runners who can run at 23 to 25 minutes for 5k.  Felix had an idea (from the Olympic fever) to have us to race on track.  The date was set to November 25th, 2012.   Track race would be everyone's game, because runner would see other runners ahead of you.  To win the game, it should be all about the tactics where should the runner pace and place himself and when to do the final kick.

There were 4 opponents on this race: Daniel, Jack and Shawn and Jay.  Daniel had a better PB of 22:50, he was faster than me on the last 5k and other two 10k races.  Jack had a PB of 23:07 recently and a strong sprint runner.  Shawn and Jay would run a sub 25 minutes where Shawn would give a strong sprint to the finish line and  Jay was unknown to me.  I had a record of 23:10 on my 5k race this Spring.

After the first marathon, I did not run a lots because I was relax and a bit lazy.
About a month before the race, I started to train again, I ran 2 times a week and mostly doing 400m interval.  I could only run up to 4 laps under sub 4 pace.

I had spent time to watch a lots of youtube races (specially those 5000m races) because I wanted to see how the winner runner placed himself at the beginning, the middle and when he would start to sprint to the finish line. 

My goal was to be the tail of Daniel and/or Jack.  If I could keep up with them then I would have a chance of winning this.  I would wear my Garmin but I wouldn't look at it because if they had ran at the fast pace then I would afraid to follow them. 

race lineup:  Jack, me, Daniel, Shawn and Jay

The weather was very cold, suddenly temperature got drop overnight. There was snow and this was the first snow of this year but everyone was showed up.

When the Race start, Jack went out so fast, he was flying, he was 200m ahead of everybody else.  I would want to follow him like I did on mec 10k last time but I talked to myself to calm down and took it easy at the beginning.  Since I was outside at the line up, so I tried to get to the inside but Jay was keep running the same speed that i ran.  Finally, I got pass him and got to the inside after 1 lap or so.  At second lap, I heard Daniel who tell me to move out a bit for him to pass and that was what I was waiting for and i followed him from this on.  We passed Jack at 4 or 5 laps or so and he seemed to be done.  So this would be Daniel and me game and I knew if i could stick with him then my chance of winning this race would be really high.  I was very concentrating on the race and stick to him,  he ran slow, i ran slow, he ran fast  I ran fast.  Daniel did run a consistent pace from 4:50 to 4:25 pace and got faster and faster in every k, but I was able to keep up with him.  About 100m to the finish line, I make my move, sprinted to the finish line and never look back.  I won the race!

run with Daniel

 
I won the race because: I was confident physically and mentally due to that I believe that i can run a sub 23 by my half marathon calculation, and Daniel had  under estimated me since i was always lost to him couple races.  On the other hand, Jack had ran so fast at the beginning of the race so that he ran out of energy otherwise I would have a hard time to battle with him.  Daniel had helped us to separate the 23min guys with 25 min guys, so Shawn and Jay had no chance on this race.