Festival Foods Turkey Trot - Race Report

The Festival Food's Turkey Trot is an event that has become a family tradition, not only for my immediate family, but also my parents, brother, and his girlfriend.  This year was the 6th year of the Turkey Trot and the 2nd year it has been run in Downtown Appleton, as opposed to Menasha the previous 4 years.  My mom and dad have done the event from the very first year, while I have now done it 4 of the past 5 years.  The only reason I missed the race in 2010 was I had just started working for Winnebago County Sheriff's Office and was training on 1st shift.  The event itself has become a rather large event, which is fantastic.  It offers families a great way not only to spend quality time together, but quality time together exercising prior to a traditionally glutenous holiday.  I've heard that average person consumes roughly 4,500 calories on Thanksgiving day!  So, when a community comes together to offer an event to promote health and fitness, I'm all for it.

Training Plan

I honestly, did not have a full blown "training plan" for the Turkey Trot, but did have a rough outline of days I would run and days I would not run.  Basically, my plan consisted of 3 runs per week.  I would do a fartlek run on Tuesdays, a moderate distance (6-8 mile) run on Thursday or Friday, and a long (8-10 mile) run on Sundays.  The days between I would either take off and rest, swim, or bike.  I was extremely flexible with my "plan" and would not go to great lengths to make sure a workout got in on any particular day.  Bare in mind, that I was technically still in my off season recovery mode from Ironman Wisconsin, back in September.  With that in mind, I definitely took it easy, and ate like absolute crap (not proud to admit it....but hey, it's the truth)!

Day/Night Before the Race

I finagled my work schedule to get the night before Thanksgiving off.  I had to pull a trade with a buddy of mine, which isn't always easy to pull off, considering it was the night before Thanksgiving.  I not only wanted to participate in the Turkey Trot (which I would have regardless of working the night before), but also to spend at least a portion of Thanksgiving together with my family and daughters.  The day before the race was spent with the family.  Maya, Delaney, and I made a pie for Thanksgiving and then had dinner.  I made stuffed acorn squash for dinner and for the first time ever, I had beer with dinner the night before a race.  Not just one beer, and I didn't stop at two, but had 3 beers with dinner that night.  I think that goes to show where my priorities have been at this off season.  Either way, I got to bed at a reasonable hour and had everything set for both the Turkey Trot in the morning and Thanksgiving.

Getting to the Start Line

I was tired and honestly wanted to stay in bed when my alarm started going off at 5am.  But, I got up, poured a cup of coffee and hopped onto Facebook.  I saw that someone had posted something to the effect of there being snow for the Turkey Trot.  I quickly jumped up and looked outside and sure enough, there was about 1-2 inches of snow.  The first true snow fall of the 2013 winter...on Thanksgiving...the morning of a race.  The kicker is, that last year it was 60* outside.  Now this year, it was snowy and 20*, quite the difference.  None-the-less, we woke up the girls and bundled them up and were on the road by 6:45 and on our way to downtown Appleton.  After finding a parking spot and putting off getting out of our warm car until the last possible moment, we met up with my parents near the start line to pick up our race bibs.  My dad and I then did a short run to start warming up and at 8:00, it was back to the start line for the start of the race.

5 Mile Run

Not that it was a major concern of mine at the start of the race, but in the back of my head I was wondering exactly how much of an impact the previous night's snowfall would have on the race.  It was only a light snow, but definitely enough to impact footing, especially on corners.  The first 200-400 yards of the race went straight West down College Av, which is the main drag of Downtown Appleton, so there was little to no snow in the streets.  But almost immediately after turning right off of College, we were on side streets which were not nearly as clear.  If you stayed in the area of travel for vehicles, the roads were clear of fresh snow and were either just wet with water or slush.  I started the race as I do with all races, slower than most.  I have never gone out like a bat out of hell like 98% of the participants do, I don't know why I don't, I just never have and don't ever plan on changing.  Naturally, I had a decent size group ahead of me, but I was fine with that, knowing that it wouldn't be long before they tired out.  By about mile 2 or so, I had passed majority of those who go out too fast.  By mile 3 I started to feel as though I had gone out too fast.  I began to focus on my breathing and just tried to get into a rhythm.  It seemed to have worked, maybe my pace didn't increase, but I felt comfortable as the race progressed.  The snow really wasn't as big of an issue as I had thought it might be.  It really only impact the race on the corners.  You could not take the corners at full speed, for risk of slipping and falling.  As you approached a corner you had one of two choices.  1. You could slow down and take the corner cautiously.  2. You could take the corner wide, where the earlier vehicle traffic had melted majority of the snow and you would be able to stay on concrete.  No matter which option you choose, you're adding seconds onto your time.  Not a lot of time, but they add up, there's no doubt.

By mile 4, I was taxed, but new the end was near.  Right after the 4th mile marker is the vaunted hill that not one person looks forward to.  Could the hill come at any worse part of the race?  Well, I suppose it could, it could always be at the finish line, but still a big hill right during the last mile....sheesh.  After I pushed up the hill I decided to crank up the my pace and push.  I passed a couple additional people on the last half mile or so.  As I was coming down the home stretch there was one more guy in front of me and made it my goal to pass him.  With about 2-3 blocks left, I had passed him, but

he had one spare match left over, where I, on the other hand, had burnt all my matches.  He sprinted past me on the final 50-100 yards to finish ahead of me.  Honestly, I wasn't too upset about it, probably because I knew I had nothing left and he was just better then I at that point.  I finished the race in 31:32 (6:19/mile).  My time last year was 30:56, so I did not set a new PR, which I was really hoping to do, but all things considered with the colder temperatures and snowy roads, I was pretty happy with my race.  Ultimately, I only added 36 seconds to my time, or an additional 7 seconds per mile.  I placed 29th out of 2,838 finishers and 3rd out of 29 finishers in my age group.  My dad finished in 35:20 and placed 117th overall and 1st of 24 in his age group.

Festival Foods Turkey Trot - Details

Post Race

One of the coolest things about the Festival Foods Turkey Trot is the free pumpkin pie!  A lot of participants choose to donate their pies to the local food pantry which is also very cool.  In past years, I have opted to donate my pie, but this year I picked up my pie with the intentions of bringing it to work that night to share with our department's "3rd Shift Thanksgiving," since I had to work that night.  The race does not put a lot of money and/or effort into the post race spread, which is quite alright.  It's simply not what the race/event is about.  The event is about promoting family and fitness on a day that has been overcome with sales, shopping, and pre-Christmas preparations.  They do still have water, bananas, and doughnut holes, but nothing in addition.  Since I had to work that night and we had plans of spending Thanksgiving with my family that day, we didn't hang around too long after the race.  So after Sarah, the girls, and my mom finished the 2 mile walk, we loaded up the car and headed home to get cleaned up for our family feast.

Other Notes

Part of me is satisfied with my race time while another part of me is thinking I really let myself down.  I wonder whether or not I could have gone harder/faster with the fitness that I had.  I honestly wasn't sore at all after this race, which is odd, especially after a 5 mile race.  I also feel as though I really have fallen off the wagon, so to speak.  I have eaten everything that I have avoided in the past and really just been a slob (relatively speaking).  I've been caught between me wanting to enjoy my down time after finishing the Ironman, but that has now been 3 months ago, and I am still just eating crap foods that do nothing for me other than taste good.  I have been feeling cruddy, my stomach has been in knots, and my sleep has been sub par.  I can only think of pinning the blame on my piss poor diet.  I keep telling myself that I'll make the change tomorrow, or next week, or after the holidays.  I never say, "I'll make the change today."  It's frustrating and I only have myself to blame.  I know I need the break, not only for my body to recover, but also for my sanity.  But, I should know that taking a break doesn't mean a green light to eat what ever I want when I want to.  I know that doesn't fit into a successful off season recovery period, it does just the opposite.

Lessons for Future Events

There were not any real lessons taken away from this event.  Simply put, this is also a late season race, which always comes 1-2 months after my season ending "A" race.  I rarely put any emphasis on this race, training wise and honestly, just take it for what it is, a great tradition to do what I love, with the ones I love.

What's Next

I have been spending the past month or so now compiling a 2014 race schedule.  I have for sure put the Green Bay Marathon on my list for an early season marathon.  I am taking a new approach to my training this year for a marathon and will be focusing all my efforts to run a sub 3 hour marathon.  I will post my training plan on here soon, but all I will say for now, is that it begins Monday, December 16th!  So stay tuned for a post on my training plan and specific workout detail on how I plan on running a sub 3 hour marathon.