Quest for a Five Kilometer PR (Personal Record)

The five kilometer Forever Friends race on Sunday at the Elco High school represents my last chance to set a personal record for this race length. I remain slightly hobbled from my twenty kilometer race on Labor Day. I must carefully increase my training mileage without re-aggravating my groin injury.

As I run more races I am getting much better at pacing. In order to eclipse my current 23 minutes and 20 seconds 5K PR I need to finish each kilometer under a 4 minute and 40 second pace. This pace is equivalent to a 7 minute 31 second mile. For my last 5K in Hershey, which was my second best 5K run of the year, I averaged a 4 minute and 51 second pace and finished in 24 minutes and 16 seconds. This pace is equivalent to a 7 minute and 49 second mile.

I recently figured out how to set up my Garmin Forerunner 305 watch to record my split times at custom distance intervals. In order to get feedback on my pace more frequently throughout a race, I set up my watch to record my times at half kilometer intervals. A half kilometer is slightly more than a quarter mile or one lap around a running track.

Using the paces mentioned above, I need to record half kilometer splits under 2:20 to set a new 5K PR. In order to beat my second best 5K run off the year I need to log sub 2:25 half kilometer splits. The numbers I will have running in my head throughout the race will be 2:20 and 2:25. If I consistently remain between this interval I will finish with a good time.

I will record ten split times for this 5K race. This affords myself an excellent opportunity to manage my pace throughout the race. In essence, I will get a report card every 500 meters. I believe this race is run on a road, on trails and finishes on a track.

Update: I re-aggravated my groin pull on the last lap of my training today. I will be resting for the remainder of the week in an effort to have my leg heal as quickly as possible. Setting a 5K PR this Sunday now looks very bleak.