Frosty 5 KM Race Report

Happy Friday, folks.

What. A. Week. I am still adjusting to a new position at work and until all members of the team are in place, it is a bit of a frenzy. Add in my training hours and basically all I am doing these days is sports and work.
This week, despite the busyness, I headed to Whitby with my parents to a speaking event with Ontario Shores to explain our family’s experience with adolescent anorexia and why we are over the moon excited that there is now in-province care!

My sister needed to go to Utah for a number of treatment rounds and it would have been a life saver to have her receive it here.

Want more information? I did a video series with my family a number of years ago for National Eating Disorder Awareness Week. (Filmed on an old iPhone and edited by me – the quality is wretched but the message is there.)

I wanted to thank you all for your personal comments and emails regarding my blog post on Wednesday. As a perfectionist and a runner, sometimes I tend to over react when every workout doesn’t feel perfect. This week I focused on recovering my legs, eating well and sleeping lots and I am returning to tackle a difficult interval session tonight, full of energy and legs full of power. Pacing is something I will continue to focus on but the reality is, it is important to not let perceived failures get in your head.

A little bit of a negative intro to my race recap, but I did want to chat about the Frosty 5 KM last weekend. I decided to run it on the Thursday before the race and use it as a metric to see where I was at in my training, going into the Laurier Loop next weekend. That being said, I gave this race everything I had on race day.

The Frosty 5 KM is held in Burlington, ON on the waterfront and it is a smooth, quick course. We ended up having perfect weather on race day and it was a lot of fun to be out there. They had a record number of participants this year (over 800!) and one of my favourite things was the awesome winter New Balance zip up that you get for participating.

Sponsored by New Balance and Mercedes Benz, the Frosty 5 KM was celebrating its 20th anniversary this year so they had post-race Chili and Steam Whistle beer along with a concert.

The actual race itself was a unique event for me. I am familiar with racing with thousands for the main event of the half marathon so lining up with 800 for a 5 KM was a new experience. I did my pre-race warm up ritual and took to the start line, mentally preparing myself knowing the pain would be over in less than 20 minutes.

I was a little uncertain of how my pacing would work because I forgot my Polar watch at home and had to borrow Mark’s old one for race morning. Add to the fact that when the gun went off, I looked down to check my pace and couldn’t see anything, I decided to just run by how I felt. I am still not there yet, let’s just say that.

Mile 1 –

Amazing. There was a down grade and I just focused on staying steady and feeling like I was floating. Legs felt awesome and I remained fairly consistent. I had a negative split in mind so I focused on keeping gas in the tank, staying strong and focused. I was battling for second place female at this point.

Mile 2 –

There was a turnaround at 2.5 KM and for some reason, I just dropped the mental ball the second I turned to go back instead of turning up the heat. The girl I was running with shoulder to shoulder managed to pull ahead of me just a hair and as we hit the third kilometer, I let her go and a part of me died inside. I felt like I was running through cement and I immediately switched my mental game to focusing on my form which is what I do when I am tired.

Mile 3 –

I barely remember this one. I was hurting and struggle bussing hard with the second place female pulling about a 5 second lead on me. Suddenly, I heard ragged female breathing behind me and heard someone cheer on a girl’s name and a switch went off and I just mentally went blank and pushed my body as hard as it would go. I started gaining on second place and crossed the finish line less than a second behind her.

I finished as third female overall with a time of 18:34 which is my new 5 KM PR.

Looking at my very positive split 5 KM, I know I have a stronger race in me. That being said, I am celebrating my achievement of a new PR and looking critically at this race to see how I can do better next time. It was a gorgeous, well organized course and I would love to race it again next year.

What are your plans for the weekend?