Luke - 11

CASA Champions For Children 8k, 26:04 (1st).

Was definitely not sure how I'd do on this one because of a kind of crazy week. After Saturday through Tuesday nights in the cab, I had to do a lot of walking for errands on Wednesday on about two hours of sleep, and then worked 4am to 4pm in the sheet metal shop on Thursday and Friday, mostly standing, in big ol boots. Probably got eleven total hours of sleep Wednesday and Thursday nights. Hadn't had time to go to the store so dinner Friday night was one (1) packet of Ramen, and breakfast before the race was a mug of tea. Got a good amount of sleep the night before, about 10½ hours, so that was good (although when I woke up at 7 I wanted to go back to bed). Got a bit of a later start than usual, starting my warmup (running to the race) at 7:50 for an 8:30 start. Picked up my packet just before 8:15, changed into my race shoes, did a couple short easy strides, ditched my warmup clothes/shoes near a bush by the start/finish, and headed to the line. Randy Hilliard, who I have mentioned on here before, was there so I talked to him for a bit. I also recognized the cousin of my old roommate Patrick...his mom (Patrick's aunt) was putting on this race for CASA, which is Court-Appointed Special Advocates, an organization that pairs up abused kids with volunteer advocates...definitely a good cause and all that. Anyway also on the line was one guy who looked semi-fast, although he had one of those giant Garmin watches so I told myself there was no way I'd let him beat me.

At the gun I took off pretty fast like I always do, going right to the front. There was a small rise and then a slightly bigger downhill, so the downhill got me going pretty well. Just as I started thinking I would be running the whole race alone in front, Garmin guy came up behind me and soon passed me. I was like, sweet, a little competition. I tucked in behind him and just let him do the work for a bit. After not too long I felt like we were going a bit too slow, but I stayed behind him anyway and figured I would let him take us through the one-mile mark, then I would count down from 15 and take off if we were in fact too slow (I don't know why but I always think of that as my go-to strategy--going not right at the mile mark, but 15 seconds later). Since the race was on the bike path, there are quarter-mile markers on the ground that I was able to check. The first split I got from those was either an 81 or 84...I can't remember which, but too slow nevertheless. I thought about waiting for the mile mark (this was at about .75mi), but decided against that and instead threw in a nice surge. Passed Garmin guy and just about passed the lead bike as well, I guess he wasn't really ready for my surge. Kept up a pretty steady effort and passed mile 1 in 5:11, which I was very happy with, not crazy fast or crazy slow. Thanks Garmin guy. Mile 2 I felt good on too, any time I noticed I wasn't where I needed to be speedwise I was able to throw in a surge (and many times almost pass the lead bike again). Went through mile 2 at 5:13, so I figured I was right where I wanted to be. I was trying to treat the race like a 5k, so really going out hard the first three miles, and I was thinking just behind 5:10 pace would be ideal.

Just after the second mile mark there was a turnaround, so I was able to see how close everyone was and all that. Garmin guy was probably almost 30 seconds back at that point. Randy Hilliard was in fourth or fifth, and I gave him a "Way to go Randy" and also gave a "Good job Patrick's cousin" to Jackson Mestler, who was in tenthish, but whose name I couldn't remember until his friend was cheering him on at the finish line.

Crossed the river and took a hard right onto the bike path on the other side, passing up the water station, and crossed what they claimed was the third mile marker in 4:59. I knew that wasn't right. My next, uneventful mile was 5:28, so I figure I really ran a couple of 5:13s or so. Last mile really tried to push it; the two biggest hills were in this mile but it's not like they were actually long. The first was getting onto the bridge back over the river, and then after the bridge the path takes a sharp turn and heads downhill fairly steeply, goes under a different bridge, then goes uphill just as steeply. Short, but takes a bit of effort. Throughout the race I'd been using the lead bike as motivation...even though I wasn't actually competing against him, of course, it was nice to have someone in front of me to aim for. Anyway just after that nonsense it was like 200-300m to the finish, and I was able to kick it in hard. Thought I might be under 26, but was certainly not disappointed with 26:04 (5:11 last .97mi). My watch said 26:04 and the clock said 26:04 as I finished, but the official results have me at 26:07...lame.

After the race they had chocolate milk! I had 3 half-pints, and 2 half-bananas, and a bottle of some weird pomegranate sports drink. The second-place guy (Garmin guy) came through just over 27, and they announced his name as "Jason Vaughn". I thought they might have messed up or something, but I went up to him after the chute and congratulated him and asked if his last name was Vaughn and he said yes! Also Jill (Patrick's aunt; race director) asked if we were related, we had a pretty funny conversation there, kind of a weird coincidence. I got a random prize of a Nike shirt. It's slightly small but very cool-looking, I like it a lot. I stuck around for the awards, and for winning I got a big blue ribbon and a metal thing shaped like a silhouette of a runner and with a hook below, apparently for putting race medals on. Kinda cool I guess.

Really good morning. 26:04 is my best PR according to running calculators, and more importantly to me I felt really good doing it, so it gave me a lot of confidence going forward...my other races recently I haven't felt very fast or fit, and I was able to do well here even after a crazy week of working 71 hours and not getting enough sleep or proper nutrition. 5k next week, should be in the 15s finally, hopefully even somewhere near 15:40...I'm excited!

Oh and ~3mi c/d.