A.M. Law Days 5 K. It used to be a rather non-eventful run as far as competition is concerned. Until law firms got somewhat serious about recruiting top local runners for their speed teams. Chad's law firm, Curtis, Manning, and Bradshaw put together two teams this year. Things were serious enough to where I did not make the A team and had to be sent to B. For a good reason. Our A team had Jeff, Paul, and Josh Stephen for men, Lindsey Dunkley and Emily Bates. They were well matched by Olsen Shaner - Teren, Nate Hornok, Albert Wint, Sue Nielsen, and Devra Vierkant. I warmed up with Jeff and Paul. We ran the course in 22:13. The course had been changed, and looked good. The kilometer marks were present and all reasonable. The hills have been shortened, and the course appeared definitely faster than it used to be. The weather was perfect. I set five goals at the start of the race, and am happy to report that I met all of them. They were to break 17:00 equivalent of the old course, not to get chicked (Lindsey), not to get lawyered (Andrew Hansen) , be the first fluent Russian speaker across the finish line (in other words beat Albert), and be within reasonable distance from Josh. I realized in my pre-race pickups that I was not ready to run a 5 K like a 5 K and decided to think of it as a 10-15 K race figuring that the excitement of the race plus knowing in the back of my mind that I was going only 5 K would fix the pace in the right direction naturally.
1 K 3:19 - Uphill, sharp turns. At the start I figured Lindsey will naturally hit the right pace for the first quarter, so I just ran right next to her. If it was a male competitor I would just draft, but I wanted to be a gentleman. Plus she is so small that unless you are 5'2 you do not get a whole lot of benefit of drafting behind her. Then Andrew made a move, and I just got on his tail. I fell back a bit trying to relax, but then Andrew slowed down a bit and I reeled him back in, 2 K 6:49 (3:30) - Most uphill of the race. Andrew went into a gutter at around 1.3 K mark. I did not want to go there with him. That encouraged me to make the passing move. He wanted to stay in the gutter. He was apparently struggling some. He could have latched on and kept me from dropping him, but he would have had to come out of the cutter to keep meaningful contact. Took a split at the mile. It was 5:21. Timed Albert, it was 5:14. 3 K 10:05 (3:16) - Downhill with some uphill. Surged to close the gap with Albert, then rested behind him until the start of the hill (around 2.6 K), then sensed he was losing it a bit and made a passing move. 4 K 13:20 (3:15) - Downhill, but lots of turns. Had to ask volunteers where to go a couple of times. Josh is starting to come back. 5 K 16:27 (3:07) - downhill, steeper. Decided the best way to hold off the people behind me is to focus on closing the gap with Josh. It worked. Jeff had a great race and was still with Teren in the kick, then just lost the kick finish second. This is a breakthrough race for him.
Final times (unofficial): Teren 14:52, Jeff 14:55, Paul 15:17, Nate 15:20, Josh 16:13, me 16:27, Andrew 16:31, Albert 16:33, Lindsey 16:39. I think our A team won. There is a suspicion the course was a bit short. Albert's GPS showed it as 3.03. I would be willing to believe that the GPS was off but the times while right for a normal course are a bit too fast for so much uphill and turns. But I would say it is roughly comparable to something like Heart of Holladay or Murray Fun Days.
Did a long cool down with Jeff afterwards, ended up with 16 miles, and then went to the zoo with the family. Saw Paul, Stacy and their son Seth there. P.M. 2 with Benjamin in 15:40. Last quarter in 87. Jenny and Julia ran 2 miles with Sarah. I rollerbladed along.
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