Bazan Bay 5k

March 6, 2011

Just a quick report before I race again this weekend over in Vancouver at the Dirty Duo 25k. Bazan Bay always attracts a large and fast field largely due to its fast and nearly flat course. It is an excellent course to try for a PB. This year, it was easier for some elites to come over from Vancouver because the start time had been shifted from 9am to 11am to match the rest of the Island Race Series races.

I figured a PB for me was certainly possible since I had been racing well so far this year and I had set a 15:30 as an A goal (last year I ran 15:47). I decided for the fist time in a while not to look at my km splits while I was racing and just race based on how I felt.

Once we got underway, I expected a fast start since there was plenty of talent in the field (including Jim Finlayson, Steve Osaduik, Matt Clout, Jon Bird, Sean Chester, Trevor O'Brien, Andrew Russell, and Craig Odermatt). I was surprised, however, since what we got underway, it didn't seem that fast at all and by the time I passed the 1km marker in 3:04 I was still with the front pack running beside Steve. Even before I have been running competitively, Steve has been a fixture in the local racing community and one of the better runners in the county with an impressive resume. Needless to say, racing next to someone of this caliber is not something I am used to doing and I briefly thought that I must be going way to fast. I pushed the thought aside though since I felt very light on my feet and I decided to continue on and and see what happens.

The second km also went by quite quickly in 3:01 (I only looked after the race) and I was still feeling great. There were only a half dozen or so guys in front of me and I was ahead of some people that I normally only see the back of so I knew I was doing pretty well. The turn around came just before 3km and Paul was there on his bike shouting encouragement to his Aspire Runners. I wasn't expecting it, but after the turn around we encountered some wind on the return stretch. It wasn't brutal, but was still a factor, especially at this point in the race and combined with a slight uphill. I had passed Trevor earlier in the race, but he passed me in the windy section and I tried to tuck in behind him for a bit, but then I decided to put a bit of pressure on him and passed him back. As usual, I just found I don't like to follow although I should learn how to use others to improve my racing.

I stopped feeling great with about 1.5km to go as things started to get hard. I know I slowed down a bit, but other that my dueling with Trevor, I didn't seem to be losing much ground. I bore down and did all I could to keep my pace up. As usual, the last km seems to last as long as the first 4 and felt twice as hard. I don't know what my last 3 km splits are as I missed the 3k marker and the 4th was placed in the wrong location too near the finish. I picked up the pace a bit on the final stretch to the finish, but didn't have a ton left in the tank. Trevor managed to push by me and finish 1 sec ahead. My official time was 15:36, good for 7th place in a competitive field and 7 placements better than last year. Without the wind, I'm confident I could have got pretty close to my A goal of 15:30, but I am quite satisfied with a 11sec PB for a 5k race. I also managed to finish ahead of a few guys that I have never beat in the past so that was a confidence booster.

Despite imperfect conditions a number of other runners had great performances, with Jeremy Lawrence taking over a minute off his 5k time to finish in 17:20 and Garth Campbell posting a 13 sec improvement over his last race here in 2008. Many of my Aspire training partners also ran well, with Sean capturing 5th place overall, Shawn Nelson just behind me in 15:50 and Claire Morgan running as solid 18:06. Jim edged out Steve for the overall win in 14:58.

Results.