I was going to do Murray this morning, but Sandy was closer (since I live in Sandy), and $10 cheaper. The course looked cool, too, 'cause you do a loop around South Towne Mall. I wasn't expecting much in terms of hills, just a flat course. The first mile surprised me a little because there was a decent hill in it, but nothing too bad. I figured it made a 10-15 second difference on my overall time. Got there early so I could run the course first, but that wasn't meant to be. I had $20 in my wallet, but for some reason I thought it was going to cost me $25, so I had to head over to the ATM. Got the cash and registered, which only left me about 10 minutes to get warmed up. Oh well. I did about a 3/4 mile warmup and felt good/relaxed. Ran into my friend Margo who just started doing 5k races this year. She talked me into this one. So I answered a few of her questions and then told her "good luck" as I went to the front of the line and did a couple strides. Checked out the competition. I was expecting a few more hardcore runners, but then I realized there was no cash in this race and I don't even think it's part of the circuit. So the good runners probably went to Murray or the big Freedom 5k/10k down in Provo. Ya, there were a few fast high school runners and younger guys there, but nobody in their '30s that I would even seriously train with. Oh well, maybe I would try to hang with the kids. Not a huge 5k, but there were about 700 people. Mile 1: Felt good out of the gate. Pushed the pace a little bit to 5:30, where it felt fast but still comfortable. I figured there would be some hills as we headed south of city hall through the trailer park (kind of funny), and there were. I concentrated on keeping the effort consistent as I slowed down up the hill. Too early in the race to risk blowing up. I was probably in 10th place at this point, and a couple young guys passed me. No problem, they looked inexperienced. Even in a 5k, you need a little experience. Sure enough, I relaxed on the downhill and the flat at the end of mile 1, and passed the kids that had pulled ahead. Mile 2: Things were feeling good. I was wearing my racing shoes, which I'm having a problem with in terms of blistering. I thought it would be ok for a short race like this, but I was still feeling a hot spot on the ball of my right foot. Probably 'cause I'm such an extreme forefoot striker when I race. Anyway, I was feeling a hot spot, but I knew the race was short enough where it wouldn't hurt me. The only other thing going on was some neural fatigue, because I haven't been running that fast this year. Mile 3: There was a slight hill halfway around the mall, which caused some fatigue. I pushed through the hill instead of relaxing, which made up some ground on the guys in front of me, but it also took me 1-2 mintes to relax again. At this point, I was in a solid 5th place and I knew I would stick there. I had no idea what my time would be, because my garmin blacked out before the race. I didn't really want to wear it anyway. There were also no mile markers (at least none that I saw), so it made the race very interesting in terms of running by feel. I liked that. I saw the clock nearing 17:40 and thought "ok, that's fine". I would have been disappointed with anything over 18:00 on a flat course, so 17:43 is about where I want to be. I was 5th overall and 1st in my age, and I'm pretty sure there were no guys older than 24 ahead of me. I jogged back to mile 2 (or so) and waited for Margo. Sure enough, she was in the thick of it, and I ran it in with her. She was probably doing a 9:00 pace, and she kicked the last .25 to a 8:00 pace. That's pretty good for someone my age that has just started running over the last 2 months. I noticed she was working pretty hard, but still conversational. So we'll have to work on that and see what her true potential is when she starts racing (without being able to have a conversation). | 