Gen and Haakan run a GREAT Great Race

I just love the Great Race 10k.  Seriously.  If the Ikea Half Marathon is my happy half, the Great Race is my happy 10k.  Well, last year's Great Race, when I was 18 weeks pregnant and it was pouring down rain, was actually pretty miserable, but the year before that was AWESOME - I set a PR so far beyond what I've done in any other race that I swear, I must have run through a wormhole or something.  Haakan also broke 40 minutes in this race last year, so I'd wager it's a favorite of his, too.  Even those he's Mister Speedy Pants, he decided to run it this year with me.  He did still get a super nifty elite number and seeded position at the start, but he stayed back with me and the hoi polloi, and probably had a better time (at least I hope so!).

It was a great day for a race - cool, sunny, not pouring down buckets of nasty rain like last year.  It was just plain nice.  We gave my neighbor Val a ride to the start, and it was lots of fun chatting with her while we waited for the race to begin.  I saw a guy dressed up in a banana costume while I was waiting for the porta potties, which is always amusing to see.  As usual, the races started late, and we didn't actually hear the gun.  All of a sudden it just started moving, then slowed down to it's usual slow crawl to the start.  We placed ourselves excellently and were right where we should have been (though it did take us 5 minutes to pass the start!).  Haakan's usually way up in the front so this was the first year he got to hear "Shout!" like four or five times while we moved at a glacial pace towards the start line.

We took the first mile pretty slow, around 10:40is if I remember right (I actually forgot my Garmin so I had to rely on Haakan to know what pace we were going - I chose ignorance for most of the race).  Right as we're heading down Forbes towards CMU a group from the air force catches up with us, complete with flag bearer and that fabulous chanting.  It was like something out of a movie, and very cool.  Once we stopped going downhill they passed us pretty quickly and we didn't see them again.

I didn't notice a whole lot else for the rest of the race.  we kept it under 10:00 for the remainder, and I only really felt like we were pushing it at the end when Haakan said we had a good shot at breaking 1:01 (our goal going out was 1:02).  I did pass a girl of maybe 7 years old on the big hill on the Blvd of the Allies and I remember thinking she was a trouper for doing so well.  I think she was running with her dad.  I'm really looking forward to being able to run with the boys, if they want to.

So in the end, we finished in 1:00:54 and I felt great.  I really pushed it at the end, though man those last .2 miles were harsh!  We got to see Val finishing up, too, which was cool, since I never see anyone I know at the finish line.  And as always it was nice to have Haakan as my running partner.  Perhaps the best part was coming in so far under our goal time.  In retrospect we probably could have easily brought it in under an hour, but who knew at the time?  The goal was to have a good race experience, and we definitely did.  And it was even my second fastest 10k ever (which it still would have been, even if we'd pushed harder, since I don't think I would have beaten my 2008 Great Race time of 55:14).

Here's us, the happy couple, basking the glory of a fabulous race!