Saturday, September 13, 2008

Race Report: Aztec Invitational "People's Race" 5k

Results:  8th place, 16:22.

Well I have mixed feelings about how this race went.  When I finished I felt as though I had raced pretty well and mixed it up early on, trying to hang with the lead pack through the mile. The course is actually pretty tough, all in the 2nd mile, which really kills your momentum.  I passed a few people just after the mile mark (5:0?) and from there I stayed in 8th place, briefly took over 7th on the switchbacks and then later got passed again by the same guy and finished in 8th.  It was my teammate Jeremy Brown, aka "7ft. Marine", that I passed and was then got passed by.  We worked together during the 3rd mile which is slightly downhill for the first half before you turn around for a slightly uphill finish.  

Now, the results confuse me a bit because 7ft. made a move on me with 600m to go and I wimped out and let him go, but according to the results he beat me by 11 seconds, which seems like too much.  Also, the guy behind me is listed as 1 second behind me and, after Jeremy made his move, I looked back and saw I had about 5sec+ cushion.  I did let up about 200m to go knowing I had 8th in the bag and he could have caught me a little but I don't think Jeremy put 11sec on me in the last 600m.  The reason I am rambling is that it sort of depresses me if he put that much on me and I just didn't notice and that Fernando caught me by so much.  Granted I pulled up at the finish and I guess that's what I get for not running through the line and giving less than 100% effort to finish.  Therefore, I should not bitch about it and take it for what it was.

Preliminary team results put us in 3rd, our first loss of the season.  We only fielded 5 guys and we were missing 2 of our top 5.  Adidas/Movin Shoes showed up with a full squad which we knew was going to be trouble even if we had a full team.  The other good team, BSK/Running Center, my old team, looks to have edged us as well.  Not the greatest moment in Lost Boys history but we will rebound and pick up that important 3rd win before the championship.

Knowing the season is still another 8 weeks before the championship in November and the fact that I want to do well next week in the 10k, I think the choice in this week's effort was a good idea.  I really pushed the start, cruised solo through the middle of the race, ran hard up with switchbacks and had a good go at it with 7ft. before we took the turn for home where I sorta shut it down.  Hopefully saving that effort will reflect next weekend.  I look forward to running double the distance of this week and seeing what I can do over a 10k that is on all grass with hills, sharp turns, a gap to jump...AKA REAL XC!

Updated standings:

1 comment:

Jeff Caron said...

Nice job with the quick race report. I heard the course was a rough one, so don't worry about the time.

Also, I talked to Mario and I might be coordinating a visit while he's in town next month. We'll talk more about it later.