Takes time to learn your body. lots of good advice above but it really boils down to personal experience. The key tips are to eat and don't run yourself into the ground training for the race. These early season races can be intense as everyone is testing their fitness and hungry to race.
Keep tabs on yourself during the race and write your race breakdown right afterwards:
How did the pace feel?
Were you able to keep your HR in a good place?
At what point did you feel the effort /pace was starting to catch you out?
When did you notice that fatigue was creeping in?
Then train for those efforts when you prepare for each subsequent race.
Last edited by Number400; 03-27-13 at 09:08 AM.