A good day in Draper with too many running friends to name. I had a goal of beating my high school PR (15:16), which didn't happen, but I'm still grateful for how things went today.
After a three-mile warm up--not quite like Bryant's 10-mile warm up at 6 min pace :-) we scrunched together at the starting line. The race shoots everybody through the narrow starting line and then squeezes everybody through the bottleneck finish line--a bizarre start.
The lead group quickly gapped me in the first quarter mile--I held back a bit too much early on. As the early rush of high-school kids and others who like to sprint the first .25 miles of a 5K started to fade, I had to resist slowing down. I kept resisting the urge to slow down to half marathon pace--I realized that I get to run more 5K's so they're not as foreign to me. I looked down at my Garmin and saw I was running 5:11 pace--ouch! Time to pick it up. My goal pace was 4:55. My first mile split was 5:03--8 seconds off my goal pace. I knew that my goal time was in jeopardy. The next two miles would need to be screamers.
I passed a runner from East High (Chris - I believe) around the 1.5 mark and set my sights on his teammate who looked like he was fading after trying to run with the lead group. The second mile is mostly downhill so this split was a bit faster 4:52, but not fast enough to make up for the lost time in the first mile. I decided to just keep my sights on the group ahead of me and see if I could close the gap.
I passed the next East High runner at 2.5 with a strong surge to keep him from thinking about going with me. I had Jake in my sights and just focused on catching him--I don't think I actually made up any distance but the focus ahead kept me from worrying about anybody behind me. I wondered where Kramer (Alta's stud runner) was and knew if he was anywhere near me at the end of the race I may be in trouble. Mile three split was 5:01.
As I rounded the last turn to the finish line, I had a pretty good kick in me and felt like maybe I had been too conservative. When I crossed the finish line and saw my time, my first reaction was honestly a bit of disappointment having not hit my goal for the day. That quickly shifted as I considered the course and where I finished in the field. It did more to stoke my flames and I'm really hungry to have the confidence to consider training like and racing with that lead pack. I'm not quite ready to be okay justifying my place do to my age :-) The last .1 was 28 seconds.
The conversations and the cool down afterwards were great. I ran five miles with Jake, Riley, Ben, Spencer, and Bryant. I had a very thought provoking discussion with Rob that has me taking a close look at what I want to focus on going forward. I ran another mile with Ben, Riley, and Spencer back to Spencer's house in Draper before leaving on my own to get in another eight miles. My legs felt great and I wanted to get in a full 20 today.
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