Urban Cow is another annual mainstay of the, maybe not Bay Area, exactly, but Northern California road racing scene put on by the Sacramento Running Association (which also puts on CIM). I have only ever heard good things but it is a *bit* of a hike (Sacramento, if that wasn't obvious) and it hasn't ever fit well enough into my fall plans to warrant the drive.
Why did I sign up for this race?
Urban Cow Half was a Pacific Association race this year and a bunch of my teammates were planning to race. I was planning to target the Indy Monumental Half a month later as a tune-up before CIM, so I had planned to use this race as a details-to-be-decided marathon pace workout; that way I could still help our masters team score for the event.
And then what happened?
See this post for the details, but, long story short, I somehow damaged my left ankle/lower tibia while traveling and walking a lot and couldn't run at all for over a week. It was touch-and-go whether I'd even still be able to start this race let alone finish, but somehow I managed to work a miracle and had been able to run several miles pain-free in the days before the race. Good enough to give it a shot!
The kids (as I lovingly refer to the wicked fast 20-somethings on the team) had booked an Air BnB for Saturday night but I am old and cranky so I booked a hotel in Sac with one of my masters teammates joining me. A bunch of us drove up Saturday afternoon, hit packet pickup, then descended on the Air BnB for a pasta & salad feast. 😋 Afterwards, my teammate and I headed to our hotel, set our things out to ensure a smooth and efficient morning, and went to bed.
Race day:
Race morning was pretty smooth -- we easily parked within a ten-minute walk from the start, caught up with a few teammates, then hit the port-a-potties. After that it was an easy one-mile warm-up jog, then stripping out of our sweats, dropping off our bags, and heading to the start!
I had a plan to try to run ~7:45-8:00 miles for as long as it felt reasonably comfortable, then play the rest by ear--worst case, running the last miles at easy long run pace, or if I felt good again after an easy mile, maybe alternating sets of two or three marathon pace miles with easy miles. To this end, I planted myself behind the 1:45 pacer and just tried to stay in his general neighborhood.
I'd say things were going pretty well through about mile 5 or so--no pain in my left ankle, and the pace felt comfortable. But it was around then that I felt a sharp "POP!" in my right hamstring, the same one that has been dogging me for years now! It hadn't bothered me in over a year, so it took me completely completely by surprise.
- Mile 1--7:37
Mile 2--7:51
Mile 3--7:48
Mile 4--7:53
Mile 5--8:03
(Sorry for the lack of pictures, for some reason I got absolutely zero, like not even a single one.)
As mile 6 began, I thought to myself, "Right, well, so much for marathon pace, let's just get to the end of this without doing anymore damage." (Mile 6--8:10) Then, weirdly, in mile 7, I was able to pick it up again without too much pain. (Mile 7--7:51). In mile 8, though, it started to feel worse and worse, so I backed way off and just focused on finishing.
- Mile 8--8:14
Mile 9--8:39
Mile 10--8:34
Mile 11--8:28
Mile 12--8:24
Mile 13--8:10
Mile 13.1--????
In the last third of the race, my legs started to feel heavy even at an easier pace, which I just chocked up to stress, travel, and lack of *real* recovery (in spite of the fact that I hadn't been able to run much lately). Still, my time was respectable, considering: 1:47:11 / 8:11 pace.
Another unfortunate thing was that my watch fell significantly behind the mile markers (I can only assume due to GPS error) starting somewhere in the middle miles. I forgot to stop my watch for a while, so I don't really know what that last 13.1 split. Subtracting the first 13 splits from my official time gives a last .1 of 1:29 or 14:50 pace. I may not have been on fire at that point but I'm pretty confident I was running at least 8:30 pace! So, more likely, some of my earlier splits were a bit slower in reality than my watch recorded.
After collecting my cowbell medal and an orange, I found my teammates for a photo. We'd been I think one or two women shy from being able to score an open team, but our masters team ended up taking second! (As always, don't ask me out of how many. More than two, I hope. 😆)
So, yeah. Not exactly the run I'd hoped for, but at least the team place made it feel worth it!
Overall, this was a really excellent event--it's a pretty flat & fast course, the weather was good, and all the organization and logistics were spot-on. It was not particularly expensive even registering kind of at the last minute, and if the quality of shirts and medals is important to you, these were pretty sweet.
I'll definitely look forward to running this race in the future when I'm in a better position to run fast!
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