Andy told me about this free 5k. I registered Sunday night, and showed up at 6:40 for the 7 a.m. start. 12ish extended family members also ran, but my kids layed an egg. My 15 year old nephew threw down, so I knew this was going to be an unpleasant, tough run trying to not let him beat me. He's a swimmer, but not a runner. I thought that might help me turn back the clock. When I saw him, I asked if he warmed up. He thought he had, but I convinced him to come run with me. If there had been more time, I could have tired him out, but we only got in a mile or so. We got lined up at the start. I hung back a couple rows, but Josh was right up front. Somebody randomly shot a pistol, and we took off. I immediately lost sight of him, but expected that to happen. This course is full of turns and double backs. All the turning was tedious within the first mile. I think there are 27 turns total, so staying in rhythm was tough. I didn't have a watch, and miles weren't marked, so I ran blindly hard. Around 1.5 I saw Josh ahead. He came back to me bit by bit, and then held a 5-10 second lead. I knew I could reel him in, but didn't really care if he beat me. (or so I thought) I was happy to get some puke zone miles in. We finally worked our way to the last turn, so I thought, but there was one more. At this point, I was feeling pretty bad, and went into float mode, rather than push mode. Nobody up front was gapping me, so it didn't seem so horrible. We made 6 more turns, and were finally in the final .1. I ran in pretty hard, with a sharp left at the very end. A man called out the times: Josh 18:58, Kam 19:04. So what kills me is the slow start, the float mode, and the lack of a final push. I had no idea I would run a time like that on a maze course. 2 sec pr, but better than that, a good confidence boost. On a normal course without 27 turns, a "no float" effort, solid warmup and more than a 12 hour taper, I'm sure I could drop that time considerably. Everybody else finished 5-10 minutes later. Two of my nephews cheated and skipped some of the distance. My 10 year old niece dragged her parents across in 27ish minutes. Grandma couldn't quite keep up with her and was 30 seconds back. There was free breakfast for race participants afterward, but we had to jet to do our traditional NSL to City Creek hike and picnic. I got 7 more slow walking miles in with my little ones, plus 4 hours of paying yard work. All told, it was a long, solid memorial day without a second spent in a cemetery. Maybe some other year.
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