Master runner

 Got downtown about 5:30 and parked just south of the pancake church...I almost was too late to get my normal spot. I met up with Jimbo, Roger, Court, Jhat and later with Pauly (Eans Brother in law) went to the restroom and jogged around a bit with Pauly.

We headed down to the start line with about 15 min to go. It was kinda weird this year because they weren't allowing us to do any strides or anything before the gun. I ended up a few folks back from the front row and had to dip and dodge around some folks the first quarter mile.

I had a lot of nervous energy going through the first mile a bit fast but didn't feel like it took anything out of me. Arya and Reno ran from 1-2 miles with me and slowly drifted away. I knew if Arya was in any kind of shape he was in a whole different league. Turns out he was in shape. I  ran with a few 1/2 marathoners till the full turned off but ran mostly solo the whole way. When I got to mile 10 I saw Eric zip in front of me going down Britton rd then I could see Ashley coming out of the relay shoot. She jump in front of me and had about a 5 sec gap that I gradually wound in. She handed off to Lauren who ran with me for about 1/2 mile and I took off.

My goal was to try and keep all my miles under 6 min pace. I was doing fine until we hit the wind at the end of Britton rd. Wow what a strong WSW wind we had.  From the bridge at 17 to mile 20 I was able to pick my pace back up but then turned back into the wind going down the long stretch on Classen. I hit my slowest mile at the end of Classen but was able to snap out of that pace once we got out of the wind. I felt very strong during the race and with the cool temps hardly took any fluids or gu's. I was really great having nuun bottles out on the Higher Ground tables. I took 3 nuuns and had 2 gu's also took in a few  sports beans.

I ended up taking 2nd place for the 2nd year in a row. Hat's off to Arya for the win.