The Long Run

12.46, 1:49:00, 8:45 avg

Ran with Cynthia at Spring Lake.  Great, cool morning for running, but I was kind of dragging but Cynthia was going pretty strong so I just kind of followed along.  There was a bike race going on but it didn't bother us too much as they went by quickly.  Cynthia was pretty strong up the hill on Earnest Lee Road, which a few years ago she could not run without taking a walk break.

Finished up with a loop around the actual Spring Lake and picked it up to about 7;30 pace.

Quick snack and then headed home so I could take the dogs on a car ride to get breakfast stuff for the boys.

8.31 mi, 1:04:52, 7:48 avg

Nice cool morning again, ran at Longleaf with the Striders.  I ended up going faster than planned, felt so much better than Sunday, miles flowed together with last mile at 7:16

Dropped off big case of little bottles of water to Clark for my water donation since I didn't run to Costco yesterday.

7.11 mi, 1:03:10, 8:52 avg

Ran with Jamie in the neighborhood and out past the golf course.  Started at 7:00, was nice out again today and good to sleep in just a little bit later.  Nice easy pace but not too slow throughout and a little bit faster for the last mile.

7.58 mi, 58:52, 7:45 avg

Ran at Longleaf with Striders, starting just after 5:30.   Ran out to water stop at easy pace for warm up and then did some 400m repeats (0.25 laps on garmin)

1:27, 1:28, 1:26, 1:22, 1:28, 1:27, 1:28

Did a little cool down then did next mile at about 8:00 and last mile at 7:19

Fairly cool out but just a tad warmer than yesterday, maybe about 68 degrees.

They had little cupcakes at the social hour to celebrate what would have been Hudson's 5 year old birthday.  He was a little boy that many in the group had been running for to raise awareness for cancer.

Saw Melanie and wished her good luck at Boston this weekend.  I had seen Claudia before the start of the run but didn't get to see her afterward to wish her good luck.  So, good luck to Claudia, Melanie, Joe G, David J, Ryan, Jacki, Andrea, Jolene and anyone else I'm forgetting.

9.28 mi, 1:23:17, 8:58 avg

Ran in the neighborhood with Jamie, 7:00ish start time.  Ran a little bit extra because she had 10 miles on her schedule.  A little warmer and more humid this morning and felt like rain might be approaching.  Golf course water fountain has been broken now for a couple of weeks so we ran to a different fountain (also on a golf course but the next one over - the "fancier" one).

Robbie's Run 5K today, felt good and happy to improve over last 5K where I did 20:32.

Managed to get 19:49 which was good for 4th place overall (3rd male) and 1st place masters.  Race was put on by Stider Keith who works at Word of Life where the race was held.  My first time being there, it's a beautiful campus with a youth summer camp.  Race was to raise scholarship money to send kids to camp.

Warmed up with some easy jogging and three 30 second strides up to race pace, then had about 5 minutes to hang out at the start line waiting for the race.  Lined up in the second row.  I had one PowerBar espresso flavored gel which I found in my laptop bag (must have been there for an emergency situation) which I took about 10 minutes before the race. 

There was a good sized group ahead of me for about the first 1/3 mile or so as I slowly caught up to the smaller pack that was forming.  Anthony took off quickly and was in the lead for about the first half mile.  I caught up to him just after the end of the first mile but wasn't sure if I'd be able to put any distance on him.  At this point there was a small lead pack of three people up ahead - Jacki Wachtel (who is flying to Boston on Sunday night), Bret (Keith's early 20's son), and a teenager.  I pretty much focused on Jacki and stayed at a fairly even distance back from her for about the first two miles, it was kind of like having a pacer.

At one point I was starting to gain on Bret, maybe around 2.6 or 2.7 miles, but then he got some speed back and put some distance between us.  I was worried about Anthony coming up behind me (he runs a lot of miles, has consistently been getting PRs).  My third mile was looking like it might end up being slower than 6:30 but I gained back some speed as it was drawing to an end and then kept on accelarating as I approached the finish line, doing the last 0.15 (garmin, pretty close) at 5:00 pace (I think that is my fastest kick).

Splits were: 6:17, 6:23, 6:24, 0:45 (0.15 @ 5:00)

Masters award prize was a large jar of Dixie's Honey