Race Report: Buffalo Corporate Challenge or Always bet on
the darkhorse:
So Chase finds a little sliver in their dark evil hearts to
support a race series in the Northeast and Internationally in which the proceeds
go to local non-profits. Local companies
rent a tent, get food/beer, participate and generally have a good time. Some of the teams are hyper-competitive and
some just drink a lot and stumble the course.
This year 11,000 participates from 400 companies showed up.
I ran with my wife’s company along with about 40
others. My goals for the 3.5 mile out
and back course were 22 flat (super special goal), 23:00 (reasonable
goal), and sub 25:00 (sad goal). While I
wanted to run a good time, my secret mission was to win the fastest guy on the
team to claim a 50$ gift cert to the LRS.
My wife said that they had one fast person in the office doing it and he
was talking a lot of smack. There was
also an another unknown running, running as a guest of the team.
I line up, see my competition a couple
rows in front of me and we are off. I
try to line myself up at the correct pace but it’s pointless because no one else
does and for the 1st couple hundred yards I was dodging people to
get clear. In the dodging I lose my
target. I go through the first mile at
6:01 and felt great. I was worried the humidity
would be bothering me but so far so good.
The second mile was a long slow uphill (total gain 80ish feet) and my
pace dropped to 6:30. I wasn’t sure
were the others on her team were but I felt good and for every person that
passed me I passed someone else. Picked it up the third mile (6:17) and held
it for the last 0.5 running it @ 6:18min/mile.
I come across the line at 22:04, seconds shy of my super special goal
and beat our teams second place by about 50 seconds and third place runner by
about 2 minutes. The overall male winner
of the race ran it in 17:30, crazy fast.
The guy talking smack before said he’s never goning to hear the end of it
in the office and started making plans for next year for us to make a serious
run for the top team in the race (we’d need 5 runners at sub 23 to have a
chance).
Overall I was super happy with my
run. I only ran once since my marathon
and wasn’t sure how recovered I was.
Plus most of my speed work has been focused towards longer distance
stuff so I was worried the fast speed wouldn’t be there. Now I gotta go through and adjust my training
goals and paces. Next challenge, get my
5k back down to 6:00 min/miles (18:36).
Aiming to do it by the fall!
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