Today I wrapped up a winter race season of 4 races in 5 weeks with the Salt Lake Track Clubs Winter 15k.
After an easy couple mile warm-up with Justin Park I started conservatively in a pack that included Dennis Simonaitis. So often in these races I find myself running alone in my own personal no-man's land so I was glad to have company. There was a headwind going out so it was nice to be able to tuck in behind some other runners. Wasn't worried too much about pacing - just wanted to be in a good position at the turnaround (4.65 miles) without being in too much pain. There was some pretty intense competition for the Grand Masters title between me, Dennis, and Bill Cobler. As usual, Bill took it out fast but Dennis and I were within 30 seconds at the halfway point. We both picked it up going into the 5th and 6th miles and passed Bill. Then Dennis put in a pretty good surge and gapped me by about 10 seconds. I thought I might be able to catch him the last .3 but ended up in 13th place 6 seconds behind Dennis. Thus, my grand total of career wins against Dennis remains stalled at ONE.
Turns out they do series scoring now for the 5k, 10k, and 15k and I ended up edging Bill out for the Grand Masters championship for which I received a nice award and a nifty Brooks LSD wind jacket/shell. That was cool.
3 mile cool down jog with Dennis after. Nice to chat with him and pick his brain.
Consistent splits of 6:16, 6:13, 6:21, 6:23, 6:16, 6:12, 6:19, 6:20, 6:19, 2:06
This was my 100th race since joining the FRB in 2010.
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