Running a 5-Mile Race

Whether you are new to running, or you've been racing for years, the 5-mile distance poses an interesting challenge. It's long enough that it requires endurance for beginning runners. For more experienced and long-distance runners, the race challenges them to run fast, but also pace themselves over the five miles. The 5K (3.1 mile) distance is typically considered a sprint race for distance runners. The 5-mile race, however, is just a bit too long to be sprinted.

I recently ran the Van Metre 5 Mile run in Ashburn, VA. The average temperature was about 39 degrees, partly sunny. On a personal level, the 5-mile distance is significant to me because I always used to run 5 miles exactly whenever I worked out, before I started racing. To follow is a mile-by-mile report of my race.

Before the Race
You might have thought that this race was some life-altering event based on my anxiety dreams the night before. I dreamt that I was late to the race, that I couldn't find the race, that I got into a car accident on the way to the race, that I forgot about the race. Any anxiety dream you can think of, I had it. I tossed and turned all night and ended up with very little sleep.

I went to the Starbucks near my house for my usual pre-race coffee (just half a cup) and bagel. I was upset to learn that the bagel shop near the Starbucks had gone out of business, so I had to settle for a reduced-fat piece of coffee cake from Starbucks. I drove 25 miles out to Ashburn where I parked my car, got my bib number and warmed up. There were about 600 people running this race. My goal for the race was under 40:00, (under 8:00/mile).

Mile 1: 8:00 (8:00 pace)
I had no idea what the elevation for this course would be like. Mile one featured a large hill, and I felt like I was going maybe 8:20-8:25, so I was happy when I passed mile marker 1 at exactly 8:00, according to my watch. This was the coldest race I've ever run, probably just a few degrees colder than last year's Turkey Trot 5K. It hurt to breathe the cold air. I could see my breath. I kept spitting ever few minutes. I don't know why I spit in races when it's colder.

Mile 2: 15:20 (7:20 pace)
Mile 2 had a nice downhill, so I ran it very quickly. This was my quickest mile of the race, thanks to the downhill. I was still hurting and cold, but by the end of this mile, I told myself I was almost halfway there. We ran through neighborhoods with nice, relatively new houses. I tried to distract myself from the pain in my lungs and discomfort by looking at the houses.

Mile 3: 23:00 (7:40 pace)
I was feeling really confident about the race at this point and I figured I was a shoe-in to beat my goal, and beat it by a lot! This mile was mainly uphill. It wasn't very steep but the hill seemed endless. By this point, I had stopped spitting, and was bored by the scenery. There weren't many houses around, just kind of a boring street with some construction going on nearby.

Mile 4: 31:00 (8:00 pace)
I slowed down a little bit on this mile. I was getting tired and my legs were sore from so many hills. I had been training primarily on a treadmill due to the cold weather, so I wasn't prepared for the hills. My San Diego runs had some significant bridges, and I did a somewhat hilly 14-miler the weekend before, but that was the only hill training I had done.

By this point, I was averaging a pace of 7:45. Had I continued with this average pace, I would have finished in 38:45. This was my expected finish time. I told myself that all I had to do was knock out a 9-minute mile and I would make my goal. It seemed like I was guaranteed to make my goal, especially considering I like to sprint the last few minutes.

"Mile" 5: 40:17 (9:17 pace)
No way was this last "mile" a true mile. I was running as fast as I could. My legs were killing me, but I was sprinting up hills, and when my watch said 38:00, I was wondering why the finish line was no where in sight. I wanted to make my goal so badly so I sped up even more. I was probably going at a pace of 7:00 at this point, possibly even faster. Where the hell is the finish line! Finally, I crossed it at 40:17, yielding a 9:17 pace for that mile. I was so disappointed. I thought to myself that there is no way that last mile was a true mile. I just about killed myself to get to the finish line.

I walked around and started listening to other runners complaining about the last mile. "My last mile was 2 minutes slower than all my others," one man said. I went over to talk to him and told him that I had a similar experience. I then heard another group of runners talking about the same thing. They were all on track to meet their goals, but the last mile took them much longer than expected. Apparently, due to the construction, they had to change the end of the course from what it's been the past 14 years. And they must have measured incorrectly. All of the runners I spoke with said the same thing. One person estimated that the last mile was actually 1.25 miles.

I e-mailed the race director to find out if the last mile was actually longer than a mile. He replied and said that someone later measured the course, because they had been getting complaints, and the last mile was actually 1.2 miles, making this a 5.2 mile race.

In any event, my official time for this race was 40:17. My average pace (calculated for 5.2 miles) was 7:44.

I ranked 32 out of 222 women finishers.
I ranked 7 of 41 in my age group.

Notable iPod songs:
- From Yesterday (30 Seconds to Mars)
- Counting Blue Cars (Dishwalla)
- Love Like Winter (AFI)
- Anna Molly (Incubus)
- This Ain't A Scene, It's An Arms Race (Fall out Boy)
- Reclusion (Anberlin)
- Common Pleasure (Jason Mraz)

I highly recommend that you sign up for a 5-mile race, whether you are new to running, or you are an experienced marathoner. Although it's not as "standard" as the 5K or 10K, it's its own gem.