Boxing Day 10 Miler

For the last few years a friend has run the Boxing Day 10 Miler in Hamilton.  It always sounds like an awesome way to keep on track over the holidays so I decided to jump on the wagon and do it this year too. 

Yesterday was the day!  It was a noon start race which was difficult to navigate as far as eating and drinking went in the morning but I did fine with it.  The run was pretty tough and pretty awesome.  There is one pretty big hill just before the halfway point but the beauty of that is you go back down the hill again.  I started out really strong. The cut off time was pretty tight with my pace so I had some alerts set on my watch to make sure I was within the limit but not going so fast I would hit a wall.  During the first half I felt strong and fast and my watch was confirming that I needed to slow down a bit.  I let myself go a bit faster than I normally do because of how good I felt.  The hill came and I was on pace to blow my best time out of the water.  The hill took that lead away though.  I made it up it in decent time but coming back down I could feel a nagging twinge in my right hip and knee.  This is an ongoing issue that hasn't bothered me in a while.  I kept on going but by the end my leg was screaming and tight.  I had to walk some but was able to keep my splits within the range of needed.  I finished with two minutes to spare for a time of 2:28:13.  I am happy with that because it is a full 3 minutes faster than my fastest 16k run ever.  I will be back next year to make that number even smaller!!