The 2009 Shave Your 5K Challenge

The SY5K Challenge is back for 2009, which means another year of relentless speedwork, searching for local 5Ks and me ignoring your e-mails for months on end. When I first announced the SY5K Challenge last year I got a little too addicted to creating rules, because it made me feel important, but the post ended up being waaaaaaaayyyyyyyy too long, albeit delightfully pretentious.

This year in the interest of making things simpler there will be no limitations on when you have to run your stubble 5K or your smooth 5K. Run them both the same day if you want, see if I care. Furthermore, if you submitted a smooth time race for last year’s challenge then I’m putting that down as your stubble time this year, meaning you only have one 5K left to run. Those of you who ran slow races at the end of last year are sitting pretty, but if you run a fast 5K early in the year and feel compelled by the spirit of good sportsmanship to have me update your 5K stubble time (like Sherry, one of the winners from last year) then you can feel free to do that, and also, you totally lack a killer instinct. Since some of you seem to enjoy running on New Year’s Day (when you should be sleeping in and shaking off the cobwebs of the previous year) the contest will end at midnight on January 1st, 2010.

Depending on the number of entries there will probably be 3 different starting corrals: The Super Fast Corral (sub-20:00? sub-21:00?), The Half-Fast Corral (21:00 to 29:59), and the Awkwardly Named Corral (30:00+) that doesn’t want to call you slow but is totally thinking that it could beat you in a footrace. Shaving will be calculated solely on percentage of time shaved and will include bumbling, mathematical errors which are not to be pointed out or questioned for fear of insulting me.

It shouldn’t need to be said but please participate within the spirit of the competition, which is to see how much faster you can get in 2009, not to set the bar really, really low and see how much you can clear it by. That’s what work is for. If you run a race with a slower friend then don’t submit that as your stubble time, there’s no sandbagging allowed. And of course just to try and cover myself from a legal standpoint, all of the lengthy terms and conditions from last year still apply.

All entries should be submitted via e-mail and should include your time, the name of the race, your blog address (if you have one), and your name or online identity.

So, who’s in?