Berbee Derby 10k Race Report

Every Thanksgiving Day in Fitchburg, a race called the Berbee Derby takes place.  This was the first year that we decided to do this race as a family.  My mother and sister ran/walked the 5k and I ran the 10k.  I have to say, it was a pleasant change from the usual "sleep in, engorge ourselves with food while watching football and drinking at 10 AM" schedule.  While the forecast had called for sunny and 55 the night before, what we awoke to was a very different story.  Windy as hell, 35 degrees and overcast.

We arrived at the event about an hour early to score a prime parking spot, but we also realized at this point that there was no place to seek shelter from the cold (besides a tent which was not much better than being outside).  Being that this race is on Thanksgiving, it would have been nice for the race coordinators to organize having the nearby building open for people to stand in while they waited for the race in the event of extremely cold weather/wind.

All that aside, once we started warming up it was a non-issue.  I had my goal set to break 37 minutes, as I had run 38:03 through 10k when I did my 15k a few weeks back.  The course was sort of an "out-and-back" where we would have the wind to our back on the way out, and into our face on the way home.  I wasn't sure if it would be better to try and make up some time on the way out and try and survive on the way back, or hold back a little on the way out and really grind it out on the way home.  I figured I'd just run hard for as long as I could and see where it got me.

I decided to start just off the front, so I wouldn't be tempted to go with the lead guys as I knew a lot of them from high school and knew they would be running significantly faster than me.  One of these days maybe I'll be able to control the adrenaline of the race better than I do now...

...The gun went off and I went out at what I thought, was an easy comfortable pace to start.  I saw the mile 1 clock and I think my jaw dropped.  5:20, 5:21, 5:22... I crossed the actual mile mark at about 5:37.  Shit.  Well, I told myself I may as well try and hold it for as long as possible and build up some time chunks that I could rely on later in the race when I slowed down.  Here's how it went:

Mile 1: 5:37

Mile 2: 11:20 (5:40/mile pace)

Mile 3: 17:00 (5:40/mile pace)

*It should be noted that we turned back into the wind at mile 3

Mile 4: 23:20 (5:50/mile pace)

Mile 5: 29:20 (5:51/mile pace)

Mile 6: 36:00 (6:00/mile pace)

10k Final time: 37:13 (6:00/mile pace)

Age Group Result: 12th / 79

Overall Male Result: 29th/ 997

Overall Result: 30th / 1891

1st place male ran a blazing 33:17 (5:22/mile pace) and the first place female (who I actually ran with until about mile 5) ran an incredible 36:29 (5:53/mile pace). 

As you can see, after about mile 5, I hit the wall pretty hard.  I went from running 6 and sub-6 minute miles to running the last mile in 7:40 (which I'm not sure that I slowed down quite that much, I think some of the mile markers were a little bit unevenly spaced).  However, much of the last mile was uphill, into the wind, which was killer.  This course was much hillier than the 15k course I ran in Chicago, which is to be expected because Chicago is so darn flat.   I was initially disappointed with my age group result until I realized that my age group took up 12 of the top 30 overall spots, 5 of which were in the top 6.  I suppose I can't be too upset because I still don't consider myself to be "in shape" or "trained" for these events as of yet.  Maybe next year!  I was more disappointed to miss my sub-37 minute goal, but will definitely relish in the experience of doing something positive and productive on Thanksgiving.  I was also very happy that my mother and sister had a great experience as well.  We will definitely be doing this race again next year!  I will post pictures soon :)

Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Cheers