SLC HALF
Went into this race with some but not alot of expectations. I didnt cut back mileage at all. Plan was to start incorportating temp runs into my longs with the hopes that by June I will be ready to go for the Utah Valley Marathon. So with that said....
I stayed the night in SLC with Bret Ferrier, got to the start around 6:15 and did a light warm with strides. As the race started it was a pretty stacked field from the get go patrick smythe, some guy from colorado, bret hales, matt poulson, steve shepherd , mike nielsen. Knew it was going to be fast!
My overall goal was to hit around 5:20 pace for the race and just stay back regardless where the pack was and how the race was going. First mile was pretty casual with some good up and some good down, then it went straight into the avenues and climbed a little bit, race went into city creek bcanyon which was gorgeous. At this point I felt comfortable and was hitting a couple sub fives and some five teens, and I was being dropped fast! I had to stay calm and look at the overall perspective of things and let them go. Mile 6 was little up hill and with some down in 7 and killer steep up around mile 8. By this time I actually was gaining on the group and ended up catching Matt at 9, only by default. Matt had some major GI issues which totally took him out of the race. If that didnt happen I wouldnt have caught Matt, he was looking strong. Now at this time I could see Mike about 10 seconds up but at mile 10 I had an unfortunate bathroom stop which took about a minute. Once I came out I felt really good and had some solid miles into the finish. Overall with the bathroom break my avg pace was 5:24 min/miles. Not sure of my time since I stopped my watch in the bathroom, but will post it as it comes available.
Overall I was 6th place.
Cooled for 5.5 miles, with Justin, Scott Keate, Steve and Mike
2 mile warm
13.30 SLC HALF
5.50 mile cool
total miles- 20.80
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