Day 3,353: The Intown Ten

The first 100 finishers were awarded flags. I placed 44th.

When the Intown Ten was created five years ago, I decided to stay away from this race. Costing $40, it was a little more than I was willing to pay for a 10K and being in my neighborhood, I knew it was way too hilly for me to enjoy.

This year was no different. I'd already paid $33 to run in the March 5 Chattahoochee Road Race 10K in Sandy Springs. I guess I hadn't seen that race's course, or thought about it much, and when I did I decided it might be better for me to run in a hilly local race as opposed to one a drive away with hills in the second half of the race.

So last week I signed up for the Intown Ten, with its exorbitant late fee of $50 (although I had an $8 neighborhood discount code). I skipped the Chattahoochee race, although I stopped by a day early to pick up the race shirt since I'd paid for it.

For the Intown Ten, I did my homework, running the entire course in three different easy runs and then looking up the elevation on my Garmin Connect data. I plotted out 10 hills on the route and the climb for each and made a gameplan.

I'd learned a few things running in the Feb. 6 Tartan Trot 10K, namely of how much large hills really put me out of the race. So this time around I decided I would run the first three miles, much of it downhill, at a 7:30/mile pace, much slower than the 7:20/mile I planned to run last week's Charles Harris 10K.

When the race started, I could not believe how fast the pace was. I was constantly trying to slow myself down and still there were dozens of people running far ahead. I battled running at 6:55/mile and then 7:00/mile before finally settling into the first mile at 7:16. Mile 2 (7:21) was no different but at least I was at a pace that I was pretty used to. Before this milemarker, some guy pushing an orange BOB stroller passed me and zoomed ahead.

Near the end of Mile 3 I could hear the clip-clop of footsteps and it was this tall guy in red passing me. There was an older guy in a yellow-orange singlet who still kept ahead of me. Even though this part of the course was downhill, I felt that if this stretch lasted any longer I would not be able to keep up in the race.

Fortunately, the course turned up one of the largest hills of the course and I reached Mile 3 at a 7:39/mile pace. I didn't worry too much even though it was slower than what I wanted since I'd inadvertently "banked" several seconds from Miles 1 and 2.

It was here where I started to pass people, and then a few more going up the next gradual incline to Mile 4 on North Morningside Drive. The people I passed included that tall guy in red and we were back and forth for a while, me maintaining my pace, when we reached Mile 4 on Courtenay Drive (7:31).

The course here was pretty steeply downhill. I ran in a pack of four people, including the red shirt guy and then another guy in a blue "Endurance" shirt. It seemed like he was really intent on making sure I didn't pass him and he was constantly speeding ahead.

Coming up the short hill on Amsterdam Avenue

As we came around the corner to the short, 45' rise on Amsterdam Avenue, I thought to myself to that guy, "You're headed for a trap!" as the worst of the hills were about to come. When I turned here, I felt like I had great footwork here for negotiating the hill, product of doing countless "scissor kick" sessions over the last two months on the FitStar app. I passed him and ...

... then I saw my family on the sidewalk waiting for me. Almost to show the people behind me that this surge up the hill didn't bother me, I blew my family a kiss and then turned on Brookridge, getting myself ready for the winding hill on Elkmont and Park drives. Mile 5 was right at the top of the hill here (7:10).

Running up Amsterdam Avenue

At the intersection of Park Drive and Virginia Avenue I could see runners negotiating the Ponce De Leon Place hill ahead. I could also see the guy with the orange stroller and I thought to myself how I needed to catch up with him.

I did so right before the turn to the final hill on St. Charles Avenue. The guy mentioned to me, "One last hill," and I chuckled with him before pushing on ahead. I really wanted to say that I wanted to train with him since I do a lot of stroller running myself.

This hill was hard. It's only a 50' rise according to my old elevation data but it was every bit as daunting as doing Cardiac Hill in the Peachtree Road Race. I just set my sights on the stoplight at the turn on Barnett.

Here the course goes into a deep downhill that levels off and then rises slightly to the finish. You can see the finish line here and I didn't immediately push down the hill as I needed to catch my breath as the marker for Mile 6 passed (7:32).

At this point I caught up with a guy who looked like he was in his 30s. As he turned to me, I told him, "Let's take this," and would have run with him into the finish. But I could tell that his response was more of a "I'm going as fast as I can" and I decided then to just push as fast as I could.

I ran down the downslope and had the funny feeling like I kicked too much too soon. I had about two blocks to go before I would finish and I felt like I could only kick for one more block.

So I decided to fake it. I slowed a little and during the first block, tried to move my arms faster to make it seem like I was running fast. As soon as I saw the stop sign for the last street before the slight uphill finish, I gave it everything I could. I kicked even harder when I saw the gun clock was at 45:40, giving me a very good chance of finishing under 46 minutes.

When I finished (45:55) I was out of breath and could not even stand up straight. I looked around for a place to lie down but didn't find any. It turned out that this last part was one of the fastest quarter-mile intervals I have ever run. I did that final distance in 1:26 for a 5:45/mile pace. Normally it takes me 20 more seconds to do what I consider is a pretty fast interval for the distance.

After the race I went to the staging area at John Howell Park to grab some water. I heard some people talking about checking their age group place at the finish line so I went to look. I saw that I'd placed third in my age group and was pretty psyched to have run a fast race on a course that I thought I would run a few minutes slower. I waited around for the awards but it turned out they only awarded age group winners (and gave the first 100 finishers flags as in the picture above).

It was nice to run in this race, as it was comfortable knowing the entire course since it is in the neighborhood and it's surely going to help me when I run in the March 20 Publix Georgia Half Marathon.

I have to give props to the FitStar app's core and body workouts that I have been doing for the last two months. Although these hills were hard to run up, my legs did not feel fatigued like they have in the past.

The hills are one of the cons of this race -- it's pretty brutal at the end. Also, it irks me that they don't have three-deep age group awards.

So it was nice to run this once.

Time: 9 a.m.
Temp: 46 degrees
Gear: Technical T-shirt, short (Honolulu Marathon '14), shorts, cep compression socks, Brooks Pure Connect 3.