The last race of this year was on the 23rd of November 2013. It was a 5K run at Tartu Novembrijooks (Tartu November Run). Prior to the race I got a little nervous but I really didn’t have time to think about too much since I was busy with school etc. But when Heidi made a post about her goals for this race on her blog I got to thinking what my goals were…
Friday night I figured that it would be pretty nice if:
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my time was under 35 minutes, ideally under the magical 30 minute line (not realistic)
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my average pace was at least under 7 min/km like in Tartu Tudengimaraton 10K, ideally under 6 minutes per kilometre (unrealistic, my fastest ever 6:52 min/km)
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the weather was nice
That was pretty much about it for my goals or dreams for that race.
I woke up at 8.30 AM. On Saturday the weather was OK: really foggy but no rain which made me so happy. I ate regular breakfast, nothing special. Then I decided to walk to the race place and back, it was about 4,5 km there. Not so bad. I left my house at around 10 AM and got there around 10.45 AM. Waaay to early. I jut had to stand there, be bored and get cold. And as a not so pleasant surprise, it started to rain a little.
The start was at noon. By then, the rain had gotten even stronger. The more we ran, the stronger it got. My face was dripping in water and I had no mascara left on my eyes (I thought some would be nice since there would be pictures taken… not one of my wisest ideas).
First kilometre was pretty good, I was fast (6:01 min/km). Then the second and third kilometres were also pretty decent, still fast for me as my average pace at those points were 6:22 min/km. At the end of the 4th kilometre my average pace was 6:21 min/km.
God knows what happened then but at the end of the race my average pace was 6:26. That means that I must have slowed down without even noticing it.. The splits show that I was indeed slower at 6:38 min per km but note that it’s still fast for me!

Overall results were great actually. I can be satisfied with myself because I managed to get my fastest average pace at running and I felt good after the race. I even felt I could have pushed myself a bit more and probably gotten under the 30 minute mark but well… It didn’t happen this time, maybe next time it will 🙂
This race showed me that running shorter distances can be fun and useful. I should try running under 5K distances more often and try to get my speed up. It’s a nice change to my regular 7–10 kilometre runs.
After finishing we quickly took a picture with Heidi and then her friend gave us a lift to town again. I originally planned to walk but I was soaked, started to get cold and was actually happy I didn’t have to walk another 45 minutes.

You can watch a video summary of the race. You can see my back for half a second at 1:21 😀
Results:
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My official time: 32:22,4
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My RunKeeper time: 32:34
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Average pace: 6:25 min per km (fastest ever!)
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Average speed: 9,35 km/h
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My postition: 283rd (out of 300 that finished)
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My position among women: 113th (out of 124)
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In my agegroup: 55th (out of 62)