I got up early to avoid the traffic, and arrived at 5:40 AM. I sat in the car with the heat on until 6:15 and then did a 1.5 mile warm-up. It was windy out. While waiting for the start I kept worrying that I had on too much clothing, but the temperature and wind felt especially chilly to me. When it was all over the two layers, gloves and cap were fine. I listened to my iPod the entire time to help distract me. The organizers had to delay the 6:45 start for 30-45 minutes, because some barriers blew over along the course. We finally started and I tried, really tried, to maintain MGP for the first 8 miles. After that we were allowed to speed up if we wanted to – if we had it in us. The miles were: 8:24, 9:24 (slowed down too much, so sped up again), 8:35*, 8:35*, 8:03 (downhill), 9:14 (water), 8:26, 8:34*, 8:35*, 8:23, 7:48, 7:48, 7:31, 0:46 [* forgot to press timer, so halved split]. I know, I know, I went out too fast and just couldn’t slow down – sheesh. Near the end, when going down Duval I cranked it up. The wind was at my back too. I was happy that I had the energy at the end and did not break my form. Also no cramps or pains. At the end I was trying to break 1:50, but completed in 1:50:11. What’s strange is that I should be ecstatic with my time and my energy level, but I’m slightly bummed because I didn’t break 1:50 and I wasn’t even racing especially early on when I was trying to run at MGP. Final pace was 8:25 minute/mile. Overall it was a good race.
Update: Oh two more things, I ended 8th in my age 60-64 group, and today my name was in the paper because I was a top 10 finisher for my age group. Very nice!
