Striders Half

Drove to the race this morning really excited to run this course.  Everyone has been telling me how pretty it is.  I left my house at 45 degrees, and arrived somewhere in Ogden at 35 degrees!  It was a cold start. 

Ran 1.5 mile warm up and saw a bunch ladies I knew to chat with.  I thought this will be such a fun training run with a group of women.  And it was for the first mile or so, and then I started to feel antsy and picked it up a bit.  I don't think anyone went with me, so the group run didn't last long for me.  I wanted to stay more at 6:05-15 pace to kept it a true tempo effort. 

I passed a few guys and then at mile 3 the guy I just passed decided to run with me for 5 miles with his loud music playing and hard breathing.  Fun.

We kept it on pace till about mile 9 or 10 and then the course got harder.  Which then the kid decided to take off his shirt and pick it up.  Good, get outa here!  So now I was really alone (pretty normal though in a long race).  And my pace slowed up to about 6:20's for a couple miles.  I started picking it up the last mile, and was catching the same naked kid.  Then with about 600m to go, he sprints away to the finish.  It would have been fun to beat him. 

I finished first girl in 1:21:43.  My pace averaged 6:14 and it felt really good.  Nice to not be totally beat at the finish.  All the top women had great races and were so close together!  I ran about 4 mile cd with Josse and Mac cheering on Karen and Erika. 

This was a more challenging course than I thought, not fast.  But the weather was ideal and perfectly calm wind!  Loved it