DES NEWS HALF
Headed down to the Des News Half with Riley basically in the middle of night. Left my place at 3am, picked Riley up at the park n ride and headed to SLC. Hopped on the bus around 4:30 and got to the start with with a little over an hour before gun time. Met up with Bret Hales talked with him for a bit. Then the 3 of us did a 2 mile warm hit some secret bathrooms and headed to the start.
Beginning of the race sort've felt like Deja Vu from 2 weeks ago. We know what the outcome was going to be as long as we just went through the motion of the race and ran to the best of abilities.
Well gun went off and Hales jumped out to an early lead and that was the end of it! haha. He nailed a 4:36 first mile or around that. Riley was 4:53 and I was 4:56. By mile 2 Hales was long gone. Riley still had about a 3-5 second gap on me then he slowed just a tad and let me catch up. He had been sick all weekend and still was sick. He said that he was going to pace me for a bit to help me to my goal of sub 1:07, then most likely drop out of the race. I said stick with it as long as your in the money even if you have to slow.
Mile 2 was 5:04. Riley said that is too slow. Haha. We need to be sub 5 as long as possible. Next 2 miles were 4:58, and 4:59. Mile 5 was a tad slow at 5:04 but we bounced back at mile 6 and 7 with a 4:56 and 4:53. Now we were rolling! Mile 8 was a tad slow, we took a hard right then headed to the U of U. We hit a 5:10 and I could feel the legs starting to tire. I held on to Riley for the next mile and hit 4:58 so made up the difference again. Mile 10 had a good down and then a solid up before turning West on to North Temple, Riley kept the same pace but the hill cost me some seconds and hit 5:12. Watch still showed a 4:59 avg/pace. So I figured if I didnt completely blow up I should hit my goal. Mile 11 was 5:06 which I thought was a good rebound mile. I figured mile 12 should be somewhat quick because it was down hill. But right before I took the left turn on to the parade route my watch band broke and my fell of my wrist. I had to stop and turn around and grab it. I honestly shouldve left it, but oh well. Mile 12 ended up being 5:18 and shouldve been sub 5:10. Came into mile 13 feeling optimistic but still had some work to do. Now we are heading back West with a slight have mile uphill finish. Hit mile 13 in 5:20 and then clock was at 1:05:57. The last section measured at .16 and I hit 50 seconds or 5:09 pace. Came through in 3rd place with a time of 1:06:47.
Finally nailed the sub 1:07 half time! Riley did some awesome pacing for me, and got me to run out of my comfort zone for alot longer then I wouldve done on my own. So I am grateful for him for doing that for me.
Cooled down for 1.50 miles and called it a morning
Congrats to Riley for 2nd place overall! Fritz for 2nd in the Marathon! Justin Park and Matt Poulson for taking 4th and 5th in the Half and everyone else on the blog that raced. Congrats!
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