Uncle Sam 5K and The CRAPPY Mile

On the way out.  Relaxed and still smiling.

On the way back.  The little girl in the yellow is my daughter
Kali.

This past weekend the family and I were able to participate in the second annual Uncle Sam 5K.  There were about 300 runners this year which was about double what they had last year.  It is just a fun run that is not officially timed (but we all know that I'm timing it).  It's still fun to see how high you can finish though.  It's an out an back course which allows you to see where everyone is on the way back.  The Pine View High School cross country team showed up so I realized that a top 3 wasn't going to happen like it did last year.  The gun went off and the usual thing happened.  A lot of younger kids that aren't really going to compete took off like it was a sprint and 2 blocks into the run they were getting passed by everybody.  This still usually gets me going a little fast in the beginning.  I stayed on the heels of the high school kids for the first mile (5:56) and at the half way point I was still only about 10 seconds behind a good pack of 6 or 7.  That's when the race started for them and I just tried to hang on to my same pace.  Grabbed a quick water at the turn around and headed back.  Mile 2 was a little bit slower (6:04) as I slowed down at the turn around.  It was fun to see a lot of friends and family on the way back to the finish.  I tried saying HI to them all and waving as I was running back.  Mile 3 I picked the pace back up a little bit (5:57) as I had a couple people in front of me that I figured I could pass.  The last 0.1 I ran pretty hard to make sure I didn't get passed by the guys I had just caught and I finished in a time of 18:27 which was good enough for about 8th overall.  Not my fastest 5K but I'll take it.

The next morning I decided to run the last 13.1 miles of the marathon course.  My wife Kristal and one of our friends were running 10.  We caught a ride up with some good friends who were running 16 miles.  I wanted to hold a 6:40 pace for this entire run and try to catch Kristal before the finish.  My first mile was a warm up mile and I still hit a 6:44 so figured that the 6:40 pace wouldn't be to tough to do.  My second mile I hit a 6:24 then mile 3 was a 6:03 (there is some serious downhill here).  I was able to stay pretty consistently between 6:15 and 6:30 for most of the run.  I did have one mile going up Winchester hill where I had a 7:01.  Everything was going great until about mile 10.  I started getting the urge to have to go to the bathroom.  And not the easy kind where you jump off the side of the road and pee on a bush.  I just kept thinking I only had to last 3 more miles.  I was still able to hold on to some fast miles for 11 (where I ended up passing Kristal) and 12.  As soon as I hit 12 it all went south...  I had to use the bathroom so bad that running fast was no longer an option.  I was clenching so bad that holding a 10 minute mile pace was difficult.  Clenching and running is not a pleasant experience.  I knew that there was a bathroom at mile 12.5 and the closer I got to it the worse everything seemed to get.  It was as if my body knew I was almost there and was prepping for delivery.  I wasn't sure if I was going to make it.  The closer I got the slower my running became (if you could call it that).  My biggest fear was that the park bathrooms would be locked.  Luckily I made it there and they were in the process of being cleaned by a city official.  I took care of business and then ran that last half mile to where the marathon finish line is.  I didn't care about my overall pace any more as I was just glad to still have clean shorts and a relieved system.  My last mile with that CRAPPY first half ended up being a 7:44.  Even with that mile I was still happy to end up with a 6:34 overall average pace for the entire run.  Morale of the story... DON'T CRAP YOUR PANTS.