Are you kidding me?!

Tonight was race night! The only bad thing about having a race so late (7:30pm) is that you sit around all day and try not to think about it and get nervous....at least that's what I do. I'd much rather have it at the buttcrack of dawn and get it over with. It's kind of like final exams here, some of them are at 7:45am and while most people complain about it, I like it because you just wake up and do what you have to do. Anyway it was nice and sunny today and in the mid-70's...not particularly great race weather because I like it to be a little cooler. Around mid-afternoon I checked out the weather report and noticed a big area of rain coming toward us. Great! Though I'm not a fan of running in the rain, I did run my PR in it...so I guess I wasn't too worried about that. I mean, everybody else has to run in it too. There ended up being only a brief shower that passed through but it was nice because it clouded things up and made it a little cooler.

While warming up for the race, my calf did feel a little bit tender so I was telling myself that I didn't want to force anything during the race. Kind of like this....

Mind: OK, we're not totally back at full strength, so we're just gonna run a nice, smooth race.
Body: Yea yea, OK, whatever...

Then I got to unveil my new short shorts. I felt like I was naked! Haha, I'll post a pic of the race as soon I can get my hands on one. Anyway, the gun sounded and we were off. As mentioned in previous posts, I've been injured for most of the past month and have only recently gotten back to real running, and before tonight I hadn't done any speedwork since my last 5K on May 5. I wasn't expecting anything exciting tonight and really only thought I'd be lucky to break 18:00. So I wanted to run around a 5:40 first mile, but I passed the first mile marker in 5:21.

Mind: Dude, what are you doing? I wanted you to start out a bit slower than usual!
Body: Don't worry, just let me do my own thing here.

So in order to run even splits, I kept up my "blistering" pace and ended up passing the 2 mile marker in 11:00 flat. WTF! When I ran my PR back in April, my two mile time was 11:04.

Mind: Are you out of your mind?!? Haven't you listened to anything I've said?
Body: We're fine! Stop your bitching! Just calm down on this last mile.

So now I thought I really had a chance of setting a new PR. The only problem was...I was in no-man's land. There were 3 guys about 20 seconds in front of me, and I couldn't really hear any footsteps behind me. So it was tough to push it on the last mile because I wasn't really gaining on the 3 guys and nobody was pressuring me from behind. All of a sudden, with about a half mile to go, I did hear footsteps and eventually this old guy (he was 41) passed me with a HUGE kick, I couldn't believe it! So I tried to keep up with him, and with about 150 meters to go, I noticed the clock strike 17:00. All I had to do was sprint hard....but see, this is where no speed work in the last month came into play. I had absolutely nothing left, and I finished three seconds slower than my PR, in 17:21. But still, 3rd in my age group, 8th overall, and my second best 5K time ever put a smile on my face. Plus my calf felt great during the run and didn't bother me at all afterwards. I celebrated by coming home and taking an ice bath and watching the Pistons get annihilated by the Heat :-\ Oh well....at least there's still the Tigers, riiiiiiiight?

Mad props go out to my buddy BJ too. He's fast, but recently had bronchitis. He usually runs in the 16's but he told me he was probably gonna finish around 17:30. Yea, well 3.1 miles later, he finished second in 16:27, only two seconds behind the winner. He's my motivation, someday I'm gonna beat him...

And in continuation of the story from last post, I never saw the girl that I met at that party. I was joking to my racing buddies that I probably scared her away, but when they posted the results, I noticed she finished 2nd in her age group. At least I thought it was her. So I paid attention during the awards ceremony to see if she went up for her award, but she was a no-show. Oh well. I went back to my car thinking about how I ran, and I noticed I had a voicemail on my phone. It was her! She said she busted out early so she could watch the Pistons game, but wanted to know how I did. And that was her that finished 2nd in the age group. So yea, there's a happy ending after all. With the way my luck goes with girls, I bet nothing will come of this....but you never know.