Jeff Shadley and one
of his co-workers and I drove up to Jordan, Utah in my truck to drop it off and
get a ride with Walter to Logan, Utah to the start of the relay. I wasn’t about to leave my truck at no market,
too much money invested in it. Jeff’s a
great guy and a great friend and I was glad to go up with him. I like to feed off of his determination and
great talent. It was nice of Walter to
let me leave me truck there at his house.
Thanks Walter.
Once we got to Paul’s house it was nice to see old and new
running blog faces and meet all the guys on the blue and white team. My motivation really wasn’t there to run this
relay because of the knee pain I had, and I didn’t want to hinder the team. But Cody couldn’t really find anyone else so
I needed to run. Even though I wasn’t
motivated I was going to run the best possible for the team.
Hand-off 1 Leg 9 - 9:37pm : My
3.5 mile course was pretty flat. The
first mile I felt good, but I didn’t want to explode from the start with
nervous energy so I settled into a good groove and hit the first mile at
5:28. The second mile was interesting, and could have been a
disaster. There was a skunk running down the road on the left side about 20
yards in front of me. I could only make it out when I got close because of it being night, and the headlamp doesn't really put out too much light. I then moved to the
middle of the road and the skunk moved to the middle. Then I moved back to the left and the skunk
stayed in the middle. When I passed the skunk, it raised it’s tail up so I ran off the
side of the road to the left side.
Luckily, I didn’t get sprayed or I would have been riding on the top of the
van. I finished that mile at 5:28. The last mile I hit a little bit of a head
wind, and a gradual gain of elevation in
this mile. I finished at 5:42, and felt
really good. My knee ached about a hour
after the run when I sat down, but really nothing bad. Total; 3.5 miles in 19:19 minutes 5:35 pace average.
| 