The Tour des Fleurs is one of my very favorite races of the year. You may be wondering what makes this race so special? While it is still "officially" summer on the calendar, this race is cooler than most recent races and marks the beginning of the fall racing season. It is held at the beautiful Dallas Arboretum and we get to walk through pumpkin and mum lined pathways on the way to the arboretum lawn and the start line for the race. The Tour des Fleurs is a HUGE race that is remarkably well organized with tons of vendors on the lawn giving out all kinds of free food and drink samples. The race schwag is always very nice--this year a pretty periwinkle tech shirt (however, noticeably missing from the finish line was the favorite TDF race hat). And the best thing, we always have lots of friends at this race.
The Tour des Fleurs offers a 10K and 20K distance and I have always chosen to run the 10K distance in past years. I chose 10K because it is hard to find many 10K races and the calendar always brings the Heels & Hills & Him half marathon the following week (choosing not to save my best for the half distance). It is no secret that 20K is not a favorite distance of mine--at 12.4 miles it is all of the work and pain of a half marathon without any of the glory (Erik named it the "whipping with a t-shirt"). I have only raced 20K two times in my running career and neither of those were stellar races for me. However, marathon training has brought me to a new era in my running life and my training plan called for a 14 mile long run that week. So here we are....I have officially become one of "those people" who keep on running after crossing the finish line. If I am going to run 14 miles, I might as well run 12.4 of them in a race and get all of the above perks.
The weather was cooler than we were used to, but still warm and very humid. We got a very rare soaking rain on Friday night and while it was so nice, it just made very steamy Saturday morning! By the end of the race, I looked as if I had jumped into a swimming pool--not a dry thread on me. My legs felt very tired and heavy from the moment the race started. I learned a marathon training lesson right there--if hoping to be speedy on the weekend long run, one should hold back a little bit on the weekday training runs. I had a great week of training runs and boot camps leading up to this race--and I could feel it. Oh well, onward we go!
The first six miles of this race were around White Rock Lake and were mercifully flat, but the second half of the race was a whole other story. I was just starting to feel a little bit more loose and strong when we hit mile six, but I knew what was coming my way next. I had heard the stories of how tough this 20K was and I was familiar with some of the territory that it would cover (the DRC Half covers some of the same ground), but I was in no way prepared for what was about to come my way. Erik and I hung together for this race and averaged a strong 9:16/mile pace for the first half of the race. The second six miles were a different story--turn a corner, run up a hill, turn a corner, run up a hill....over and over. It seemed that the hills got bigger with each corner that we turned. The downhills became an opportunity to recover rather than make-up time. Our average pace fell to 9:50 in this half of the race and I was thankful that each time a mile chimed on my watch the pace would show up under 10:00...funny how goals change with the terrain. It was reassuring to check the results and see that many of the strong runners that I admire most averaged approximately a thirty second drop off between the 1st and 2nd half of the race. Those hills were no joke!
Relaxing Post Race
After one last hill we made our way back to the lake trail and wonderfully flat ground for the last half mile or so. A big kick at the finish and the race was done...mostly...I grabbed a bottle of water and took a few minutes to regain my breath...and then I headed out for another 1.6 miles. I had no idea that it would be so hard to run after the race was finished. Not physically hard--I didn't feel too bad physically, but it is mentally hard to keep going once the race is over and you know that your friends are kicking back and enjoying themselves on that big green lawn. I gave myself permission to run the last 1.6 as slow as I wanted (short of walking) but ended up running them at about a 9:15 pace. I think that I was just ready to be finished and hanging out in the beer garden!
Here are the official stats:
Official Time: 1:58:28
Official Avg Pace: 9:33
29 out of 98 in my age group
And we know that no race lines up exactly the same with my Garmin, so here are my stats for all 14 miles:
Total: 14.08 miles
Total Time: 2:12:08
Avg Pace: 9:23
Elevation Gain: 390 feet
After the race I had another new experience--the ice bath. I didn't want to do it, but I am sure glad that I did. I woke up feeling like a million buck on Sunday morning, not a single bit of soreness after a hot race that included almost six miles of hills.
And now it is the weekend and I am looking forward to another race. Tomorrow is a favorite of mine: the Heels and Hills and Him half marathon. I have run this course four times before and have had some really great times here, including my current half marathon PR. The course is very PR friendly and I hope that the weather will be nice tomorrow morning. I will have to run on past the finish line again this week--this time the schedule calls for 15 miles. My longest runs ever have all been in the 15.5 mile range, so I will be approaching a distance milestone. I reigned in my training runs and boot camps this week and feel much more rested than I did last week. I am hoping for a great run. Stay tuned!
(Special thanks to Mary Lawrence for the pictures!)
