The Macklind Mile

That’s right, it’s August 5^th and I’m writing about a race that took place on July 4^th. I remember reading about the Macklind Mile shortly after we moved to St. Louis last fall and bing intrigued. I haven’t run such a short race since high school, though I’ve always kind of wanted to. I thought I would do speed work all spring and be ready for it this July. In reality I did one speed work session on the Wash U Track… five days before the race… and my hamstrings were still sore on race day. Needless to say the race didn’t go quite as I had hoped.

The one thing I (and everyone else in the race) had going for me was that the race was largely downhill, making the times artificially fast. I started too fast and I paid for it during the second quarter mile, which was slightly uphill. The last half was all downhill, but I was so tired by the halfway point I could no longer push. I just cruised on in to the finish line. I crossed the line in 5:01 (44/318 OA, 9/68 AG), a time I would have been happy with on a flat course. I can’t help be be a little disappointed after seeing just how much downhill there was. It was okay, but not great. Maybe next year I’ll actually train more appropriately.

After I finished Will ran his first race, which was very exciting. You can read all about his race here.