Boston prep 16 miler race report aka practicing death one hill at a time

Garmin results: 16.06m, 2:05:11, 7:47 pace (and for brief moments I actually felt like I was jetting around like a 747)
Official results: 16m, 2:04:11, 7:50 pace (9/94 30-39 AG; 23/279 gender)
When I posted my racing schedule for 2010, I noted that I will run the Derry Boston Prep 16 miler as a training run, @ 8:25 pace. But then I changed my mind. You see, I have a running confidence issue. I always start races too slow, and end up feeling like I could have gone faster. I am a strong believer in exposure therapy; you fear something, you go do what you fear. Simple on paper, not always in practice. The thing is, it works. So I set out today to start out too fast. It was easier than I thought, mostly because I had no idea how to pace a hilly 16 miler and because the race did not really amount to much (it's not a half marathon/marathon/10K/5K, it is an automatic PR, it is early in training, I have not run this race before, so there was no "race time" that I had to beat, etc, etc). So after a couple of miles I got enough space to pick it up. And I did. By mile 6 I was at a 7:25 min/mile average, feeling good in spite of the rolling hill. I knew that I am going to pay for this in a major way, but, the endorphins were doing their magic, and I really did not care about the near future. By mile 8 I started to feel some pain in my legs. Looking at my splits, my pace was anything but even. Heck, it was the most uneven I've ever run. I think I started to slow down around mile 9, when the hills got steeper, and the downhills shorter. I kept waiting and waiting for the monster 1.5 mile hill at mile 10.5, and let me tell you it did not disappoint. A quarter mile into it and I had to walk. My quads were done. It did not help that others were also walking....I guess misery loves company. I walked/ran this 1.5 mile section, not paying attention to the "and why are you doing this?" kinda thoughts, and telling myself that after mile 12 the hills will get easier. And they did. And I managed to pick up the pace a little, which felt good. I pushed the pace a bit, but then more hills showed up on the horizon and I slowed down. I finally picked it up on the last mile, which thank goodness it was downhill.
Here are my splits:
Mile 1: 7:57
Mile 2: 7:27
Mile 3: 7:00
Mile 4: 7:24
Mile5: 8:01
Mile 6: 7:38
Mile 7: 7:34
Mile 8: 7:28
Mile 9: 7:39
Mile 10: 8:20 -the monster hill
Mile 11: 8:32 - the monster hill
Mile 12: 9:03 - the monster hill
Mile 13: 7:39
Mile 14: 7:54
Mile 15: 7:54
Mile 16: 7:12
.06: 6:22

Overall I am happy that I started out too fast. It led to some good old suffering, which is what I needed. I think this will help me with future races, in that it will give me the confidence to start out faster than I think I can go, as opposed to regretting going too slow when the race is over. I am a little disappointed that I did not really care much about this race and my finishing pace. I did not work the race mentally. I could have certainly run all the hills, I could have certainly run the last few miles faster. But I did not. Normally I work hard to pass women who are in front of me, but not this time. Before races that are important to me, I work out the mental part a lot, but I did not do any of that this time. I am still super happy with my time, and have confidence that I can run a 7:40 pace in Boston 3 months from now. Blah, blah, blah...

Onto more exciting things.... I got to meet Mary which was fun. She ran a kick ass race, as expected (7:30 pace or something impressive like that!!!). She is exactly how I expected her to be, a little nice ball of energy! My friend Mary also had a great race, even though her furthest run lately has been 12 miles. So now, I can't wait to race again. Can you believe it? A few hours ago I was swearing running off (well, not really), and now I can't wait to race again! I think the DSM-IV needs a new diagnosis, something like Runner's Insanity Syndrome, NOS.