Only real quantitative piece of data I have is a single 3 mile tempo run that I did this Tuesday. I ran 3 miles at 6:37, and average heart rate was 167 (which is about normal for my short tempos). Back in January, when I was at my fastest, I did the same tempo run twice, at similar heart rates but at 6:16, 6:18 pace. So using that huge dataset, I am about 20 seconds/mile slower now than I was. However, I also had a lot more endurance then than I have now from running 100's of miles each month for a year. So I doubt I will be able to hold that "20 seconds slower" pace for the whole 7.5 miles.
Anyway, that's the only piece of data I have, so the goal is to run this 20 seconds/mile slower than I would have hypothetically run it if it were back in January. Back then I was shooting for a 38 minute 10k (6:07 pace), this race is 12k, so I have to do the extra 2k. 1 of those K's is up a steep hill, so I would have given myself a little extra time for that, and then hope to do the other extra K at the same pace. so total would have been somewhere around 46-47 minutes (6:10 - 6:18 pace).
So add 20 seconds each mile and you get 6:30 to 6:38 pace. This would be a finishing time of 48:30 to 49:30. Given my suspect endurance I think a goal of sub 50 seems reasonable. Of course, this doesn't take into account the fact that this course may not be as fast as the pancake flat 10K course I was running back in January, but that's just a minor detail, right? Looking at some people who I know, and the times they did last year as seeded runners, I have a horrible suspicion that I have overestimated my ability on this course by about a minute (so I should be aiming for 49:30 to 50:30).
Looking at last year's results, if I do a 49:59 (6:42 pace)
- Winner would be 16:28 ahead
- Winning woman would be 11:30 ahead
- Deena Kastor would be 10:55 ahead
- Top centipede would be 9:32 ahead - that's 16 people roped together running at 5:26 pace!
- Dude in pink gorilla suit would be 3:48 ahead
- Top 40-44 woman would be 2:03 ahead
- Top 50-54 man would be 4:57 ahead
- I'd beat everyone under 16 and over 60
- In my age group (M40-44) I'd be 23rd
- For males, I'd be 149th
- Overall I'd be 180th
So that's the plan. sub 50, top 200 finish. I found out that there are about 250 seeded runners, plus 50 elites, so top 200 would have me towards the back of the seeded runners, which given the fact that I am slow, and only got seeded because I am in the over 40 "easy seed time" category, sounds about right.
Next year, no excuses, top 100 finish (which was 46:37 last year).
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