Ran at the course today with my team to check things out. A few things to note: 1) The course is short. 2) This course is full of twists and turns. Lots of hard 90 degree turns and U-turns and other stuff. Very few long straights. 3) Very little flat terrain. Lots of up and down, but no big hills. 4) The footing is good, so the pace should be hard. The twistiness of the course is going to hurt me a little, but I think I'm going to stick to my race plan. The D2 field expanded to 32 teams to match the D1 race, which I think is dumb since the way they did it has brought in several teams that aren't even ranked in the top 35. It means there will be more people going out hard and clogging up the lanes in the first half of the race. Oh well, I just have to deal with that. My plan is to go out at my pace and let everyone else do their thing. I really don't want to get caught up in a blazing start and then suck wind the entire back half. The twists and turns aren't going to help me -- I tend to run better on straights and such, but it just means I'll have to stay focused on my pace. No easing up around turns or falling off my pace, which is easy to do on those 90 degree turns. I think it's going to be really clogged in the first half of the race. With the quality of this field, I don't think people are really going to start coming back till the second half. To me this means really opening up after halfway. I think I'm going to need a really strong 4th and 5th mile in order to get up to where I want to be. Oh, and the weather is perfect, so I don't think people are going to crash as hard as they did in Hawaii. Means I'll just have to run that much tougher. I'm still sick. How on earth does this sickness last this long? I don't know. But I stocked up on cold medication today to try to keep my airways clear. Dayquil, Breath-rights, anything I need to make sure my breathing feels good tomorrow. Right now I feel pretty good, but I was coughing up junk this morning. Regardless, I'm ready for this. I expect my body to respond well, it's just a matter of saving myself for the second half, when the real racing gets underway. | 