9:00am
The weather was perfect again for today's race; a little overcast, but dry and 51° with only a slight breeze. I did a warm-up lap around the track at about an 8:00 min pace right before the start. That is the first time I've ever done that, not sure if it helped my time or not, but I was feeling anxious and a little stiff and it seemed to help with that anyway.
The first mile went by pretty easy and when I looked at my split I could see why (I was shooting for 6:29's). Miles two and three had some rolling hills with a net elevation gain of about 125'. I didn't increase my effort quite enough to compensate for the hills and stayed in the 6:40's. My half-way point split was 21:02. Miles 4 and 5 were the reverse with a net elevation loss so I made up some time, but still wasn't averaging my goal pace. Mile 6 was mostly flat and I was almost able to maintain my downhill pace, but spent most of the mile wondering how I was going to muster up a kick at the end. I left everything on the track for that last .2 trying to catch a guy about 20-30 yards ahead of me... fortunately he wasn't in my age group and I still took first :) I had a nice negative split, crushed my previous PR, and was only a few seconds off my goal pace overall.
Distance Split pace
1.00 6:46
2.00 6:41
3.00 6:46
4.00 6:21
5.00 6:19
6.00 6:24
6.28 5:35
My wife, my daughter Karina and her mother-in-law also raced today and it is Karina's 21st birthday so I went back to run them in and jumped out from behind a bush to hose her down with a bottle of champagne before they got on the school grounds. I am SO proud of her! We made this deal with our kids that if they did not drink before their 21st we would give them a thousand dollars on their bday and she did it! After the race we presented her with a wooden chest overflowing with 1000 crinkly one dollar bills :)
Lori, Karina, and Kym (Karina's husband Danny couldn't run with us because he's on his way to Afghanistan)
Karina and Me
Karina with her pile-o-cash :)
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