Well. the race was finally here. I had been planning on sub 18 for this race for awhile as i try to get myself back in race shape. Of course, I have been looking at the weather forecast, as the worst thing for me is wind, and it was projected at race time to be 20+ mph. During the night, i woke up, and the wind was howling very bad, trees shaking, it was easily over 30 mph. I thought great, race is not going to go well.
I woke up at 515am to walk the dogs, and surprisingly there really wasn't much wind. Wow, it had died down. Good. I left at 555 am to get to the race, and we got there around 615am. I had about 20 co-workers also running the race, so we took a picture, and then i finished my warmup. I ran about 2.5 miles before the race, about 0.5 of it in surges and sprints. The wind was now about 12 mph, not too bad.
As we lined up to the start line, i noticed Devin Mancuso there, he is a solid runner and should be under 17 mins, but other than that, i didn't see anyone real quick. I was hoping for a few good runners to help me with the sub 18, but i knew Devin was too quick for me. We took off, and Devin started out fairly slow, and so I definitely wasn't going to pass him. He finally took off at about 0.5 miles in, and i stayed back in 4th place as I hit the mile in 5.46. I was ok with that, as the 12-14 mph wind was a headwind in mile 1, also it was very slightly uphill. As we turned off of Jones and onto Oakey, it is now slightly downhill and the wind at our back. I caught 2nd and 3rd place, one was a high school runner that fell of the pace, and the other was a young runner, Victor Bautista, that i knew was a solid runner. I had beat him by a few seconds at a 5k in January.
We hit mile two in 11.26, so a 5.40 2nd mile. Erica was there cheering me on. I felt good, but i knew as we turned off of Oakey, and onto Decatur, it was going to be a headwind. We made the turn, and it was a bit of a struggle, but, not bad, then we turned right back onto Sahara to finish up. Victor and I ran together from about mile 1, and i think as we came up to mile 3, we were both just hanging onto each other. As we came up to the final turn, i thought we had another block, so i backed off, as the pace was getting a little quick. Then i realized that we were turning right then, and it was the 3 mile mark. I quickly caught back up to him, and then for the last 0.1 miles, we started to surge and sprint. Now, he is 22 and I am 42, so I figured I was in trouble. He finally surged with maybe 10 secs to go, and i backed off, cause that was it for me. Well, he sensed that, and then he started to coast into the finish as the 2nd place runner. When I saw him do that, I surged again, and went by him and got him by 1 second. He shouldn't have coasted, you got to finish strong, even against old guys like me.
So I ran 17.54. I was happy. I was glad to have Victor with me from mile one, or i probably wouldn't have broke 18. The foot felt ok. The wind was tough, but not as ridiculous as i thought it could be.
Cheers
Mike | 