LOVED THIS RACE! I felt like I was a lot more in the zone on our way to this race as I have been in the past. While we were driving to our motel the night before I was listening to music and visualizing. I kept telling myself, "You will fast. You will run well. You will be strong." Stuff like that. I also did that on the morning of the race while we were headed there. The van was very quiet as everyone was zoning in and focusing. It's always a little hectic right before the race, especially when there are but few restrooms. We managed to get a 1.5 mile warm-up jog and start getting ready to roll. The girls had already run before us for this race so we knew we'd have a good cheering section. We lined up at the start ready to go. I was definitely pumped. I was relaxed and calm, but also very focused. I felt like I was right where I needed to be. Right before the gun went off I looked over at Ty and said, "5:40 first mile?" He agreed gleefully. The gun went off and we squeezed all together. There were 126 runners and it became almost a funnel into the first turn. Due to the amount of runners it became very tightly packed. I was using my elbow a bit to get people off of me. The first mile felt really good! I was thinking we were right on pace. However due to the group we were in at the start, we went out a bit fast. We crossed the first mile and she called out 5:17... Oops... Ty said, "What time did she say?" I said, "Uhhh 5:35." He then said, "Shut up! I know what she said! She said 5:17!" I just smiled and said, "I tried." It was a very funny moment. That tends to happen to us. The course was a crazy figure eight with some downhill bike path and 2 beastly uphills. The 2nd mile didn't have too much craziness. Ty and I were passing people left and right which felt really good! We hit the 2nd mile at 11:07 so our pace hadn't faltered too much. It felt about right. You usually go out a bit fast in the first mile to gain position and then you settle in. That way you don't have to worry about passing tons of people. You do want to pick it up at about mile 3 though. We did continue passing though. We went through some crazy rolling hills and Ty was hauling. I was like ohhh poop. Then he eased up. We ran down that gradual decent and we were probably at about a 5 flat pace. It was a nice hill. We crossed mile 3 at 17:02... Good pace still. The first hill was very very beastly. It was nothing like Bob Firman. We came around the bend and it was almost straight up. We climbed and climbed and finally reached the top. The only thing I could think of was, "I am never going to recover from this hill." Then a miracle happened. After it flattened out I pushed to get my pace back and my legs started to recover! Energy came back and my pace quickened! I felt good! I started to leave Ty behind at this point. We went around the big curve and Ty caught back up. Just before the decent we saw the girls and I flashed a peace sign. Then when we hit the gradual decent for the 2nd time, he started to fall back again. He had some serious sideaches. We crossed mile 4 at 22:27... Good news at this point. I could see my teammate Jef not too far ahead. Throughout the race I had been telling myself. "I can do this. I can do this. I can do this." When I saw Jef I thought, "There is Jef!" I'll finish right behind him!" Then I saw that i was gaining on him and I though, "Wait! I can catch him! I can really catch him!" I kept my pace strong. I caught him right at the bottom of the hill with about 3/4 a mile left. I gave him the butt tap and he was good. He said, "Are you ready, David?" I was like ohhh poop, he has been saving up and he is going to smoke me now. At this point my legs are pretty toasted and my breathing is quite heavy. Then to my surprise Jef didn't stay with me. I started to leave him behind and continued passing runners. At this point I had probably moved up a good 25-30 spots throughout the race. I had 800 meters left and I started recalling our 800 meter workouts and was telling myself, "You know you can do this. You know you can push it out through this last 800." I passed another couple of runners. One had a shirt that said on the back, "You trail a snail." I just thought, "Not anymore! hee hee hee!" As I was going along I saw the last hill. They were cruel and decided they wanted to put this beast hill right before the finish. I hit it and gave it everything I had to maintain somewhat of a reasonable pace. My legs were BURNING! My heart was pounding out of my chest. I passed another runner going up the hill and was gaining on one coming toward the top. Everyone started yelling, "Go! Don't let him pass you!" I just thought, "Too late... Thanks for the motivation to pass him." I picked up my pace knowing the finish was just ahead. I was giving all I had left. Then I noticed the finish was a lot farther than I thought... Oh well! Keep the pace! AHHHHH! I started to grimace... My breathing was completely sporadic and my legs were crying uncle like never before. The banner came closer and closer until I finally crossed with a PR of 28:25. Euphoria! I felt really woozy and it took me a good while to recover but it was an amazing race! I loved every second! After I finished I found out that our number one man had dropped out due to some injuries. It was sad to hear. I also found out that Oliver and Jef were basically leading the whole race for about a half a mile. They him mile one under a 5 minute pace. They went out super fast and kind of died because of it. Results 28:25 (AP of 5:43- Notice the goal on my blog :) Splits: 5:17, 11:07, 17:02, 22:27 My team: Oliver Lange: 59th 28:05 David Sondrup: 65th 28:25 Jef Marsicola: 80th 29:02 Ty Gregg: 83rd 29:12 David Perales: 97th 30:14 Ian Asay: 109th 31:28 Romnick Poindexter: 122nd 36:32 | 