It’s not often that a 10 mile race is offered in these parts. The only other I regularly take part in is the Cherry Tree 10 mile race in Prospect Park sponsored by the Prospect Park Track Club and I’ve only ever done that as part of a relay team. So this was my first real 10 mile race — automatic PR!!!

Look at how awesome that number is. So many number ones because I am so numero uno!

The course was for the most part a nice flat out and back on Grand Concourse with a few “hills” here and there but a very nice change of pace from all of our Central Park races.

Knowing that I would be adding on an additional five miles at the end of this one I really tired to keep telling myself not to race and keep a consistent pace that would leave with enough to finish the extra five. For the first half this worked out well and then those competitive juices started to flow and I started picking people off.

I was eventually able to stop doing that and even avoided a sprint to the finish. After grabbing my medal and some Gatorade I headed back up the street to get this extra mileage in. One of the hardest parts of running along the sidewalks in the city are traffic lights and the whole having to stop and all so you can avoid getting hit by a car. The constant start and stopping really too it’s toll on the final two and half miles.

I made the mistake of running back on the sunny side of the street. You’d think I would have has enough sense to cross back over to the shady side of the street but I obviously could not think clearly after 13.5 miles. The last 1.5 miles hurt. I ran out of water and just couldn’t stop to get another Gatorade, I just wanted to finish the damn thing.

Finally the site I had been waiting for, 166th Street. You never looked so beautiful. I somehow managed to stumble into a store and get my giant Gatorade and celebrate this grueling 15 miles. It was done and those five miles hurt. The race felt good and I’m looking forward to run another 10 mile race without having to add extra mileage.

Hal Higdon’s app said I ran 16 miles. As much as I like the tips and the automatics logging of the miles in the app the inaccurate mileage is just too much of a distraction. In addition to the lack of a proper pause function. Currently, if you hit pause and want to resume it restarts at zero miles. My Garmin records a very accurate distance, has wonderful distance and time alerts, and my new favorite used feature — auto-pause. That is great for city running. All of that has made the Bronx race the last time I’ll be using the app for my marathon training.