PHSC 5K "Run with the Bobcats"
22:09, 12th overall, 1st age group (no where close to getting masters award as Bob Bradley was there and put down a pretty impressive 18:42). Tom won overall with 16:25 (Strava gave him a PR at 16:08, kind of tough to run the tangents perfectly with a few hair pins on the two loop course).
This might be one of my favorite local 5K's, have been running it for years starting when it was PHCC "Run with the Quistas" 5K. Ran with the boys several times, one year with Jacob, one year by myself. Always run into people I know. Coach Jacki does a great job putting this together. This year, Tom had been given a free entry. I picked up Tom on the way there, which I was a little early for so we were one of the first runners to arrive. Beautiful morning out, cool enough that I wore long sleeve shirt and a hat while warming up. Did a little over mile and a half warm up with strides. I did not do strides just before the race so may have tightened back up a little bit.
Race started out and my feet felt stuck to the ground. I wasn't lined up at the very front and was quickly mid pack into the starting crowd. I couldn't get out of the 7:30's is seemed. As we approached where I could see the parking lot loop, could see Tom trailing a shirtless high schooler. The advantage of me being behind so many people and getting passed at the start was I'd spend the rest of the race catching up to people.
I somehow managed to get out of the 7:30's and finished mile 1 at 7:20. After the first mile I thought I had dipped into the 6's but was soon back in the 7's but came out faster than mile 1 at 7:10. Ok, after mile 2, I can do this, don't slow down.
I'd been catching up to two women (19 and 20 years old), as we went through the last couple of parking lots I finally got in front of them, turned the corner and sprinted in as best as I could not sure if I'd get outkicked in the end. Finished mile 3 with 6:58 and the last bit at the end was 6:12 pace.
With today's splits of 7:20, 7:10, 6:58 it was kind of like how some of my time trials and tempo runs have gone. Had some chest congestion earlier in the week and still a tiny bit left so with that in mind these splits weren't too bad.
When I ran this in 2016, I was a little sub-20:00 that day. Tom and Andy ran it and Andy was right behind me followed pretty closely by Tom.
This year Tom managed to hold off and put a good gap between himself and the high school runner who ran 16:58
We stuck around for awards and then grabbed McDonald's drive thru on the way back.
My parents are back in town so we all went to Rusty Bellie's in Tarpon Springs for dinner that night so they could celebrated belated birthdays for the boys.
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