TCK10K, 2014

Next up was the TC10K on April 27th which I was running for the 12th straight year. The first 4 were all around 42:30-43:00 minutes, the next 4 were all between 37:40-38:33, and the 3 most recent were 36:09, 36:07, and 36:15. So by that logic a 36:0x was probably in the cards? I tried to keep up my fitness by doing hard workouts during my lunch breaks, and felt reasonably good going into the race (unlike last year where I was burnt out from running 10 races in 13 weeks!). Some of my crazy friends were attempting a double race - first the TC10K then ~20 minutes after finishing the new Half Marathon. No thanks :)

Race day was forecasted to be a bit windy which isn't ideal along Dallas Road in the second half of the race where there is an uphill section. So I told myself that the first 5K was going to be "easy", and once you turn onto Dallas at 5K it was time to really focus and push up the hill (into the wind). I really wanted to try and maintain a good pace and not slow down like I usually do up the hill. I cruised through the first 5K in 3:33, 34, 34, 25, 34 (17:49). Along Moss Street my wife and son had just made it on time to see my fly by!

The wind was definitely moderate but I ignored it and pushed up the hill. The next 2K were very solid in 3:38 and 3:37. Back down the hill to 8K in 3:26 (~28:32) I caught and passed a group of about 5 runners. I started fading a bit from 8 to 9K in 3:38 and a few runners from that group passed me, but I picked it back up on the final K (3:19) and passed all of them but one (Lemlem), finishing is a new TC10K PB time of 35:28 - only 11 seconds slower than my Sun Run time of last year! I was very happy with that result, especially considering it was a 10 second negative split and very consistent pacing - definitely the most consistent I've ever run at the TC. As for placing, I was 29th overall (8th in my AG), my highest placing yet.

The following week I ran the BMO 8K in Vancouver.