5k has always been my best race distance. I've put out some decent half marathons and 10ks, and even eked out a Boston-qualifying marathon, but if you check the age-graded scores of my PRs, my 5k best is in another league from all of those.
That said, I like to run a variety of distances, and last year, I ran my longest race ever, the 55-mile Comrades Marathon. When I was done with that, I was ready to go back to my bread-and-butter race, the 5k. At age 57, I don't think I'm ever going to match my 17:49 5k PR I set in 2013. But a sub-20-minute 5k does seem like it might be attainable. The last time I ran sub-20 was in 2016 at age 49. For various reasons, I haven't done it in my 50s.
So back in August I ran the Greek Fest 5k just to see where I was after spending a year training for Ultras. My time was humbling: 22:14. I had a long way to go to get back to sub-20. A couple months later in October I ran the Runway 5k in 21:03. Not bad, but still not quite what I was looking for. I bought a pair of "supershoes" (Hoka Rocket X2) and doubled down on training. I managed a 20:45 at the Little Sugar Creek Parkrun. Maybe I'm too old for sub-20 5ks any more? Looking back at the races I had completed since my last sub-20, I saw that the best I'd done was 20:18 at the Sprint into Spring race in 2019. Maybe sub-20:18 was a better goal?
I ran Spring into Spring again this year but it was brutally windy and I could only manage a 21:21.
So yesterday I gave it another shot at the Little Sugar Creek Parkrun. Going into the race, I was thinking I should maybe just shoot for a 20:30, to beat my best time since Comrades. But as I began to run through my race plan I decided that it would a mistake to start out too slow. If I ran 6:35 miles (20:30 5k pace) it would be tough to do much better than that 20:30 even if I was feeling good for the last mile. Plus I hardly ever pull off a negative split in a 5k. I decided to push it just a bit more, targeting a 6:30 pace. If I felt good, I could pick it up, and even if I slowed a bit at the end, I would still beat my season's best. If I had a really great day I could possibly challenge my 20:18 "Grandmaster PR" -- my best time since I turned 50.
The weather was perfect as we lined up for the race -- high 40s, no wind. The course is dead flat, and the distance has been carefully verified, so I know it's an accurate course as well. Looking at the other runners, I saw there might be one or two of us prepared to go 20-minute or better pace. The race started, and two runners took off ahead of me -- an Irish woman and a 40ish man. The Irish woman looked to be targeting a much faster pace, maybe even a sub-19, so I settled in behind 40ish man.
After a quarter-mile or so, I looked at my watch and saw I was running about a 6:27 pace. A little faster than planned, but comfortable, so I held steady. 40ish Man was checking his watch too, and he too held steady. Maybe he was shooting for 20 minutes? That would be a 6:26 pace. If that was the case and he was a solid runner, I might be able to ride behind him to that elusive sub-20 as well.
I checked my watch every quarter-mile or so, and I was holding that 6:27ish pace, and still not feeling bad. Keep it up, Munger! I passed through Mile 1 in exactly 6:27. Not bad! But soon after this, 40ish Man started to slow just a bit. My watch was reading 6:30 pace, and I was gaining ground. I slipped by him and tried to get back to that 6:27ish pace that had been comfortable so far.
The course for this race is an out-and-back, with a sharp turn onto a bridge at Mile 1.5. You cross the bridge, turn around, and make the sharp turn again onto the main greenway, then head home. Irish Woman crossed the bridge ahead of me, made the turnaround, and I passed her as she was crossing back over the bridge. I made the turnaround, then headed back home, the other runners shouting encouragement as I passed them. Looking down at my watch I saw I was still holding a 6:29 pace. Not bad, but now it wasn't feeling quite so easy. Somehow I maintained that pace through 2 miles, so my total time was 12:56. Seven minutes and change to go.
I knew based on how tired I was already, there was no way I was going to speed up at this point, so a sub-20 was not happening. But I could slow quite a bit and still get that sub-20:30. Or maybe, just maybe I could squeak out an over-age-50 PR by running better than a 20:18. I was too exhausted to compute the exact pace I needed to run to hit these marks, but I knew I needed to keep it under 7:00 per mile. I looked down and saw a 6:45 pace. Come on Munger, you can do better than that! I picked it up again. My pace slowly lurched down into the low 6:40s. There were no mile markers for our race, but I knew when I passed the fixed 1 mile marker on the greenway, there was 1/2 mile left in the race. 6:42 pace. DON'T SLOW DOWN. I passed the 1.25-mile marker. 1/4 mile left! There was one more turn on the course, at about the end of Mile 3 of our race. I gasped for breath as I rounded the final corner. My watch clicked, but I didn't look down to get my time. The finish was in sight! I gave it everything I had and crossed the line. I stopped my watch and collected my finish token. My watch read 20:17! I had done it -- not just an age group PR, but a PR for my last two age groups, the best I had run since 2016!
After the race, I dove a bit more into the details. I ran a 6:40 Mile 3. My overall average pace was 6:32. I actually ran slowest for the final 10th of a mile, a 6:50 pace, which means I really had given everything I had. Here's a link to the Strava record of my race.
All this has made me curious about my lifetime 5k progression (which really only starts in 2010 when I began running seriously). I made a spreadsheet tracking all my 5ks for that period, and removed any that were part of duathlons / triathlons, as well as any where the distance was off or there was a net downhill. This subset of "legit" 5ks is 40 races over 14 years. Here's a graph of my results:
