USATF Minnesota Championship Track Meet: My First 800 Since High School!
>> Monday, June 26, 2023
Over these last few years, I've been wondering how fast I could run an 800, which was my event for the 2 years I was in track in high school. After some shorter-than-usual speed work leading up to a decent Raspberry Run 1 Mile race last summer, I REALLY started wondering. And then my indoor 5000 meters this past spring got another Dad from my sons' school thinking about track meets again, and that got me thinking more about track meets too. So Anton and I decided to race our races at the USATF MN Championship in St. Paul on Saturday! I'd try my hand at the 800, and he'd do the sprints.
It's been over a quarter century since my last 800, and I'm 30+ lbs heavier now, so I really didn't know WHAT to expect!!
I pulled up to park at the meet at Macalester and saw this:
You know you're at a Master's meet when the car next to you has IcyHot at the ready!
At 8 a.m., a big line was coming that was supposed to be here right in time for my race at 1. Damn it.
I mean... that's not what you want to see...
It didn't look much more promising at 11 a.m.
Ready to start (with other mutual church friends behind him).
Go Anton! That's his family behind him! He just broke 60 in the 400!
Thumbs up lining up! That's Colin Abert from MN Distance Running Elite next to me.
"ON YOUR MARKS"....... [gunshot]
My first 100 was good. Heck, my first 200 felt perfect. The pacer, the MN Distance Running Elite guy, and one other guy SHOT off, and I was tucked in behind them (and I let them go). I had given this race a LOT of thought beforehand because there'd be no time to react to anything during the race, so I had given myself lots of scenarios in my head to work through. I figured 0:31 for 200 would be on the faster side (maybe TOO fast), 0:35 would be on the slower side, but somewhere around 0:32 or 0:33 would be perfect. And I heard the guy at the 200 meter point saying "32... 33..." as I ran through. So I was on my way!
In the distance (with Anton in the foreground) around the 200 meter mark.
300 meters in. Working, but doing OK.
1 lap done, 1 to go!
This is where things really suck.
200 meters to go! (With the pacer cooling down already in the foreground.)
One thing I hadn't prepared myself for in all of the pre-race scenarios I went through in my head is that if they put everyone in 1 heat (like they did here), I could be racing against some very different paces. So I actually passed 2 people in the final turn:
Just passed that woman, and I was DYING.
Here's Henry's uncropped, unaltered, glorious finish line photo of me:
Oops. He missed. But thanks for being there Henry and Charlie!
Henry's next shot as I galloped into frame after finishing
(just after hitting my watch as you can see).
"Oh hi boys. Watch Daddy barf here on the track." *
OFFICIAL RESULTS:
Steve Stenzel, 42, M
2:17.33
3 out of 13 overall
1 out of 2 in the 40-44 age group
1 out of 11 Masters (age 40+)
Age graded: 77.81%
First in my age group and first overall Master! NICE!!!
My "Regional Championship" gold medal!
• I was SO READY for this to hurt, but I still wasn't fully prepared for it. I forgot that I could make myself hurt THAT much just 90 seconds into a race. I TRIED to be mentally ready, but I wasn't!
• That finish time was pretty much right in the middle of the window of what I thought I could do. (But what I thought I could do was based on nothing... I hadn't raced anything like an 800 in so long!) I told Henry and my brother-in-law Matt that 2:20 would be a bit of a bummer, and 2:15 would be great. That was a pretty small window for not knowing what to expect, and I ended up right in the middle of that.
• My splits were normal track-racing splits. My Garmin said 1:07.0 for the first 400 and 1:10.6 for the second 400 for a total of 2:17.6. In high school, that "ascend" was even worse (like 8 secs instead of 3: usually something like 1:00 and then 1:08) because my coach was of the "go out hard and try not to puke" mentality.
• How did this race compare to my high school times? My first official 800 meters in high school was 2:20 and quickly dropped into the teens. After maybe after half or 3/4 of a track season, I was running between 2:08 and 2:11 regularly (for the rest of my 2 years of track). My PR is either 2:06 or 2:07. So at times I feel like this 2:17 is a long ways off from that, and at other times I feel like it's pretty great to just be 0:10 off my high school PR 26 years later.
• I wore "regular" running shorts in a race for the first time in YEARS! Simple reasoning though: I had the tiny "bowl full of sunshine" shorty shorts set out to race (the shorts that went with the old Wells-Easton track jersey), but with the threat of rain, I was afraid to put those on. They turn to cling wrap and show EVERYTHING when they get wet. Nope. Stayed away from wearing those.
• My Garmin actually showed me slowing down. Here's my map of the race, and it shows me faster in the first 200 (and even registers me running wider in lane 5 for the first 100), and then ONLY GETTING SLOWER:
Ouch.
Pace shows me slowing too. I don't believe the HR.
And my cadence slows when I'm hurting... so yeah...
• Speaking of my long hilly run the week before, my legs had healed up before this race! My quads were SORE for a few days after last Sunday's long run in WI. But they felt OK by Wednesday, and nearly back to 100% by Thursday. I can't use that run as an excuse for any slower-than-desired times for the track meet 6 days later.
The boys and I cheered on Anton in his final 200 before taking off:
Go Anton!
My boys at the top of the stadium.
Selfie with Anton.
* I didn't actually barf. I was just catching my breath.
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