Racing in Belgium!

My first international race and my first international win! On Saturday Jon Peterson and I raced the 3000m the Memorial Léon Buyle race in Oordegem, Belgium.  I was very pleased to come out with the win and a new PR of 7:54.18 (previously 7:59 from 2011). Race video can be found here: (copy and paste into browser, sorry I cannot make it a link while posting from my phone!): http://www.vimeo.com/100023083

Since having arrived in Brussels, we spent the first few days at Jon's friend's place, who graciously hosted us and even made us a wonderful breakfast to help us celebrate July 4th in Belgium.

We spent the first few days getting ourselves adjusted to the time change and taking in a little of what Brussels had to offer. Come Saturday for the race, we swung by The Atomium, which was constructed for the 1958 World Fair and is an iconic structure on the skyline of Brussels.  After taking a quick tour, we drove out to Oordegem to get ready for our race.

Going into the race, my legs had felt like they have the past two weeks or so: decent, but still sore. It's difficult to explain properly, but the best thing I can come up with is how one's legs feel the day after a hard workout.  The kind of ache during the next day's run where the soreness just lingers from mile one right to the end.  I'm still wishing that my legs would come back under me and feel the way they did for the Adrian Martinez Classic (the mile race I ran a month ago), but my coach Dennis comically remarked, "Keep feeling bad if you keep winning."

The start line was pretty aggressive with a large field.  I was sharing lane three and the guy to my inside blocked me out like he was protecting the paint in a basketball game when the gun went off.  I quickly fought back to find position through the first turn and popped up right behind Chris Solinsky in 5th place by 200m right on the rail. 

The next few laps were pretty dull with the exception of another competitor trying to cut in front of me to get on the rail and cut me off.  Each time he tried to move in even though there was no room, I put my hand out on his side and gently held him off as I was already running right up on Solinsky.

Our third lap was a 65 (we wanted 62-63 per lap) and Jon Peterson came rolling up on my shoulder and sat for about 200m and then we decided to move.  He gave me a signal and went to the front we me in tow.  We rolled up on the rabbit and started to pass him, so he went wide as we came through the mile in 4:14.

Jon took the next lap through in 62, I then swtiched leads with him and hit the split, then he took back over with 600 remaining.  With 500 to go, another competitor ended up splitting us so I came into the bell lap in third, but still feeling like I had more in the tank, despite the lingering soreness in my legs.  On the backstretch I was able to shift gears to move into first and then keep things moving on the homestretch to pull away for the win.  Last lap was about a 59, which I'm happy with, but know that I need to be able to close faster in championship style races.

Overall I'm very pleased with the race, and am most happy with how Jon and I ran tactically together the last mile to pick up the pace and control the race. Although I must admit I feel that there is a lot more in the tank and that I could be running faster if I could get my legs to feel good for races. Yes, I'm setting PRs, but it's because I'm easily in the best shape of my life, not that I'm fully reaching my potential in each race. As I have mentioned previously, the way my legs feel now may be due to this being my first full training cycle under a new coach and a new program. It feels so similar to my first year of college. I can only be optimistic about how things will pan out the next few years so long as health and consistency is on my side.

Post race we gave Katie Mackey a ride back to her hotel, then celebrated with some sandwiches in the car on the way home and a Leffe Brune once we got to the hostel for the night.  Tomorrow we take off to Amsterdam for a couple of days to see the sights before heading to Leuven, Belgium (home base) to get in a workout and rest up for the mile in Letterkenny, Ireland on Sunday!

Race results are shown in the picture below.