Striders 30K. Final Race in the 5 race series. 1:55:03 2nd Overall I was not looking forward to this race as it is a long race without the "glory" of a marathon. Which makes sense since it is a marathon minus all the hard miles. I didn't really have a time goal coming into today. I was 2 mins down on Chad for the series and 2 mins up on Jon. I felt pretty secure in this spot as I thought it was unlikely that Chad would bonk bad enough to let me make up the time. You just never know though since the race is so long. I warmed up a few easy miles with Jon as we watched the sunrise. It was about 28 degrees at the start, but starting to warm up. By the end, it was just perfect weather. We (Chad, Jon, Ben, Nate) started out very easy and chatty for a few miles until we got bored with the pace and Chad and I eased away from the group. It stayed pretty relaxed for a few more miles, but was not easy by any means. By mile 9 I was feeling sluggish and Chad made a 10-15 sec a mile move that was just enough to drop me. I slowly continued to lose time to him over the next 9 miles as he was by far the strongest out there today. I switched from hanging on to Chad to treating this as a tempo run to get ready for Ogden. I hit some faster stuff when i could, and slowed on the rollers. I was pretty spent by the end, but kept it together to finish strong. I am happy with the race as it shows significant improvement over last year (duh, of course). I am still not sure about my time goals for Ogden, but figure to be between 2:40 and 2:45. Good job Chad for winning the series and doing so convincingly. Good job Jon for toughing out the sickness and securing third. Good times. Here are my split for those interested: 1-6:54 (long, but at 6:19 pace) 2-6:15 3-6:13 4-6:11 5-6:09 6-6:15 7-6:15 8-6:15 9-6:12 (bye bye Chad)
10-5:57 (downhill now) 11-5:49 12-5:52 13-5:56 14-6:00 15-6:14 (rolling hills again) 16-6:12 17-6:22 18-6:17 18.6*something - 3:44 (5:46 pace) 1:55:03 (6:10) 169 ave 183 max 4+ min PR over last year Best news of the day though, was Bethany is 3/4 the way through her test and has passed all portions until now. Only one more day of testing! Yeah for Beth!!
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