Warmed up 3.2, a bit with myself, a bit with AmberG. Was 34F but sun was out and it felt warm enough for shorts, so I did shorts, singlet, thick knee highs for arm warmers and dollar gloves. Yesterday Clyde told me he thought the whole Utah Elite running team would be there, including Stephanie Talley, and I thought I didn't have a prayer with her in the field and me only in half shape. So that kind of took the pressure off. Also saw and chatted with RAD and the way cute preggie KellieS, who I recognized from her preggie profile. She was going to do the 5k. 7 minutes before the race start, I was frantically looking through my backpack for my car key, to put my backpack away, and TylerS said hi. He ended up helping me tear through my backpack, and did the clear thinking for me, and found my key in my coat I had warmed up in. I don't know what I was thinking. When we were looking through the bag I found my race bib, which was still not on my singlet (oops). So I got to the start line with 1.5 min to spare, barely remembering to take my last long sleeve layer off. My strategy was to just keep an eye on #1 girl for the first mile to just see what's up and if I have a prayer. I thought I might be able to sustain 6:30. I have barely been able to do this for a 4 mile tempo, but a bit lower elevation, a bit warmer temps and race magic would hopefully make it feasible. Besides being above 1:25 is different than below, for where I need to be right now. I will give splits by mile marker, though the miles marked fluctuated a bit between being dead on with my gps, and several seconds long and short. So perhaps I shouldn't have lapped the watch but I did, so that's the way it is. Mile 1 - 6:25 started out a bit too fast, but tried to calm down and keep it a decent pace. This mile felt ridiculously easy. One girl ahead of me. Didn't look like Stephanie Talley, going to fast to approach, ended up being Ericka Schramm Mile 2 - 6:23 still felt easy during the first half mile, then started to feel like a half marathon race pace, not easy not too hard. Mile 3 - 6:24 closing a bit on Ericka, I meet a guy from Cedar Hills who's friends with TylerS Mile 4 - 5:59 (this is one mile that measured short by gps, 6:12 pace per watch), catch and run with Ericka, Mile 5 - 6:14, somewhere around here I take the lead Mile 6 - 6:12 Mile 7 - 6:26 sucky steep, but thankfully short uphill at the beginning, watch said 7:30 pace at the top, but gradually brought that sucker down. Throughout the race I allow myself to take it somewhat easy up hills, thinking "this is just a fun run", a luxury I won't have in future races. Mile 8 - 6:14, have a lead, but Ericka's behind and I am starting to get nervous about keeping pace Mile 9 6:36 (this one measured long, but still) this was the suckiest mile of the race, knowing I was going away from the finish line, a bit of uphill, and still many miles ahead. I am the rabbit being chased! Mile 10 - 6:13, much better Mile 11 6:24, I am confident at this point I am winning Mile 12 6:27, starting to get hard, but trying to keep splits where I want them Mile 13 6:18, hard mile, but in mile 12 and 13 I felt like I could have pushed harder, but didn't feel motivated to dig for it. .12 in 36 sec, wow watch says 4:59 pace. Final time 1:22:54, two minutes faster than my estimate, but I am very glad I am at this point. I still have a far way to go to get in OTQ shape, so I am grateful for this 2 minute gift. They had a paper I would have ran through, being the female winner, but a woman came in two minutes ahead of me. The race officials were very on top of it and did some investigation and confirmed that the woman forgot the 5 mile last loop, so I missed an opportunity to break a tape. I hope to some day. Have never done it.
I cooled down with Ericka, 2.5 miles, got to know her a bit more. I'm afraid I wasn't successful recruiting her to the blog. Hopefully she'll call me up so we can run together when she's in UT county, though. Wonderful 10 min massage. I got some good prizes, but I thought there was a treadmill on the line, but it appears there wasn't? Still not sure what the story is there.
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