I'm really guessing on my warm up and my cool down. I warmed up with my brothers before the race. I had planned on running there, but let my bros talk me into riding with them. It wasn't hard for them to twist my arm. Anyway, my youngest brother was planning on running fast with me, but he was pretty noncommital about the whole thing. He always has trouble breathing in humidity, so I wasn't sure if I could count on him to be my pacer, which is what I wanted. Weather was perfect--on the cool side, but still humid, since we've had intermittent rain since last night. My first mile was 7:03. My little bro fell back just before the end of this mile. So I decided to pick a couple of people and just go with them. The second mile I still felt great. They had a clock and I think I passed it with about a 7:15 second mile (I was paying attention more to the water). Then I felt a little downhearted because my sons weren't hanging out where my mom had agreed to take them. I know I slowed down a bit, but then I saw them down the block and picked it up a little. I was running with a lady in black and I really, really didn't want her to beat me. We kept trading places, and I let her lead a little in the 3rd mile because it was easier for me to have her as a target if she was in front. Then I kept looking at my watch and thinking that I had a shot at breaking 23 and I tried to give everything I had. I left the lady in black (who I later realized was not in my age division) and then passed 4 or so more women on into the finish. Right after I finished someone told a girl behind me that she was the 9th woman, but I didn't really look at the results, so I'm not sure if I was 8th. I'll check and post later. So at any rate, my official time was 22:32. I looked at the results briefly when I was picking up my medal for first place in my age group!
Update: I was the 6th woman!! And one of the things that I wanted to do was beat a couple of girls I grew up with, and I did, by a lot.
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