02.08.2020 Saturday

This morning I had the opportunity to be the 8:00 min/mi Pacer at the Hot Chocolate 15K in Dallas. 

Despite swearing off Marathons a decade ago I let my brother convince me to run the a Marathon with him last fall.  It was a fast course and he figured that if he was going to do a race on a fast course he should try to PR.  He figured that if I paced him his chances of a PR would greatly improve so I signed up for the Marathon and starting to read running pacer message boards and to prepare to give my bother the best shot possible at a PR. In the process I learned that the Cliff Bar pacing team had done that pacing at this particular Marathon for something like 18 years.  I was disappointing to learn that there might be a guy in a Neon Yellow sure trying to step on my toes to pace the same speed as I would be doing for my brother.  Then a little over a month before the race I learned that the Cliff Bar Pacing team had been discontinued.  I contact the race director to see what they were going to do.  Get the local running club to try to field a pace team? Go without Pacers? Other?  I was told that there was another Pace team that would be taking over for the Marathon.  I had been training for the Marathon for months.  I figured that for a new race on a little over a month notice that the new pace team may struggle to fill pacer spots especially at the faster paces in the time range my brother would be shooting for.  So I got the pace team director's contact information from the Marathon race direct and contacted her to see if she needed a pacer at my brother's speed.  Well, I didn't pace for the Pace Team and since the pace team had 3:20 and 3:30 pacers but not 3:25 pacer I was able to work at the 3:25 pace for my brother with out anyone stepping on my toes.  I Pace Team Director invited me to apply for openings in other races which lead to my gig this morning.  I wanted to be the 1:00 Hour pacer for the 15K.  That is a big bearing in the 15K and I though helping people get under an hour would be a really rewarding pacer assignment.  The team didn't have pacers by time, just by pace, and the fastest pacer speed was going to be around a 1hr 5 mins.  So I didn't get the assignment I wanted.  My group was a 1hr 15min group by time (8:00 min/mile by pace).  I finished at 1:14:55.  I wasn't as much fun as doing a faster pace, or pacing a sibling but it was a decent way to get in an easy 9-1/2 mile run.  The weather was favorable and wonderful day for a big race.