I had a goal of 42 minutes for this race, and had been told that it might be tough to hit the goal on this course. Ran the first mile at 6:30, and the second in 6:40. Miles 3 and 4 got pretty tough, with long uphills. I was closer to 7:10 for mile 4 and somewhere around 7:30 for mile 4. Started to get discouraged after that - I thought that maybe if I could get to the 5 mile marker by 34 minutes, I might still have a shot at my goal. As I approached 34 minutes I looked up ahead and saw the 5th mile marker at the top of another small hill, ugggh. Hit the marker just under 35 minutes and figured there was no way I'd make my goal, as I didn't think I could run 1.2 miles in 7 minutes. Kept plugging away, got a mental boost as we turned the corner back onto the main road. The first and last section of the course were the access road into the state park, and it had taken me 2:30 to do that section at the start. I thought that if I could somehow hit the park entrance by 40 minutes, I might still have a shot. Somehow, I did, entering the park just under 40 minutes. Pushed as hard as I could, and "sprinted" as hard as I could the last 100 yards across the field to the finish line, crossing at 41:59.

Walked around, ate a banana, orange, and these mini Take 5 chocolate bars (pretzels, peanut butter, caramel, and chocolate - not bad at all).


Considering how tough the course turned out to be, I'm very happy to have met my goal. I still don't know how I covered that last 1.2 miles in under 7 minutes, but I'll take it. I was a little surprised at my ranking - looking at last year's results my time would have given me first or second in my age group. I think there was a bigger field this year as the weather was much nicer. Anyway, I'm very happy to have met my goal, and the competitive side of me is very happy to have beat one of my coworkers by five minutes (who was talking trash this week about me not running enough and not doing enough long runs, and how anything under 43 minutes was unlikely, and how he just might catch me at the end of the race).