Interesting race today! Curt called me last night at about 10:00pm and asked if I could help with busses in the morning, I said sure! I went up with the first buss and showed them where to turn around, and then then stood up the canyon for an hour turning busses around. It was actually pretty nice, because I was a mile away from the starting line, with a potty all to myself, and I just warmed up running down to the starting line.
I didn't feel like running today and actually wanted to stay at my wife's family reunion, but I was glad I ran. I saw Chad at the start and wanted to run with him, but a mile into the race when I was all by myself I figured he had started late or something. Dave and Sasha took off like crazy at the start, and Mike Dudley followed them. Another guy was in between them and me. I sat in 5th place the entire race and that is where I finished.
The splits were off half of the time so I quit paying attention, especially after I saw four 6 mile markers (I think the third one was right). When we turned up the road to Bridal Veil Falls the 4th place guys cut the turn around by a good half a block, I don't know if he knew that I saw him or not. No one was there to keep people honest. On the way down I saw someone turn around in front of me at the mile 7 marker, I was getting annoyed by now! But that guy ended up being Steve Ashbaker, and he was running bandit, so it didn't matter. I caught up to Steve and asked him to run with me since I had been running alone for most of the race, and he did. Steve ran with me for just over a mile and a half, and told me some of his story for the last couple of months, glad he did. Around mile 9 he dropped back and I was all alone again. I cruised down the canyon feeling pretty good and knowing I was really close to my goal pace.
Everything went well until the last couple of miles where you run through a bunch of parking lots. I went the wrong direction twice! The first time I only lost about 10 seconds, but the second one just before 13 miles was the killer. I came out of a parking lot and started running to the south where the old finish was, I got about 15 seconds in that direction and realized I had goofed. I turned around and headed back, then started to doubt myself again. Lucky for me Steve came along and was heading in the right direction, so I turned back around and headed into the finish area. I was mad at first, but now it is rather funny! At least I didn't get left behind at the start like Chad and Adam W.! I finished with a time of 1:13:46. My PR is 1:13:41, but if you cut out my screw ups I ran about 1:13:00ish, and I would have been right where I wanted to be for my goal. Oh well, it was a good race for me. I felt really strong and could have gone further, probably another half to make it a full. Maybe it is the getting up at 4:00am thing, but I was in marathon mode today, and think I could have ran good in a full marathon this morning. I ended up 5th overall and 1st in the age. I was also pleased that I ran as fast or faster today, with my screw ups, as Sasha's winning time last year. Good solid race for me!
(Tangent-168 miles)
Cooled down with Chad and Adam afterward. Everyone ran well today, but especially Dave and Sasha. Dave ran awesome, probably his best race ever, if I could be so bold! And Sasha probably had one of his best, if not his best, performances in a half ever too. | 