RYKA Iron Girl Tempe Women's Event - 10 Mile - Run10 Mile

Got there early. Radio said it was 49. I bought a cool Iron Girl shirt, and milled about until I met up with Sally. We walked around and talked and eventualy headed back to our cars to disrobe. It was very cold, but we both knew that as soon as we started running, we would be hot, so we took off our sweats and jackets, and headed back to the race with just the essentials. I remembered cooking last year, so this year I was smarter about it!! (Ran in shorts with an underarmor type long sleeved shirt with our light weight race tech T over the top). One last potty stop and then we weezled our way toward the front of the pack. The race started and the first 3/4 is along a dirt path known for it's pot holes. Well, due to the torrential rains we recieved the 2 days prior, they were filled with water. You couldn't see them coming because of the mass of people. I fought my way to the ouside, sometimes running in the grass or rocks, but it takes about 2 miles for the herd to thin out!! I was keeping a good pace, and at mile one was at 8:30. Cool! Now...could I keep that up? My body was telling me that I should use the rest room NOW, so at mile 2 I ducked into the bathroom. Nothin. GRRRRRR! Start running again and the feeling comes back. I was not stopping again. Just going to have to fight it off. I stopped my watch while in the bathroom, so my official race time is 1:30:21, so apparently I was in there less than 2 min. I am logging my "just running" time, however, as I wanted to see my pace time against last year. I started running again, and working my way back up. I felt really pretty good until about mile 7. 7 and 8 were tough. I was still running to the beat of my "Grrrrr running music," but my strides were not as long, and my push-offs were not really propelling me forward. I was kind of dreading looking at my watch to see how off my goal time I was. Finally at mile 9 I looked. If I really pushed it I could do it under 1:30, which would have given my 9 min miles. I dug deep and really pushed. That was probably my fasted mile of the whole event. I felt good about my race because I met my goal. Oh...I did not like, however, the muddy stretch we had to traverse west of the TCA. I litterally had to stomp and scuff my shoes once we hit pavement again to get the packed mud off the bottom of my shoes!! This was not to be a trail race!!! Anyway..... Irongirl puts on a quality race. It's around $40 to sigh up and you get a cool race bib with your name on it, a cool tech t-shirt, an awesome medal, and a catered breakfast afterward served on linen clad table tops with bouquets of fresh flowers on them. They had drawings afterward, but I had to meet people to try on the fit kit. I also was not feeling very well, so I just went home. Overall...good race.