Stonemill Results and my Saturday Run

I knew if I just waited a few more days they would post the race results from my 5k last weekend but here they are for you to see. Key notes:

• 28th place overall
• 5th in my group - 30-39M as I stated earlier
• I was 15 seconds out of 3rd for my group and the ever coveted trophy
• I was the fastest citizen of Roswell - it helps when there are only 3 of us in the race
• Only 4 women were faster than me and all were in their 20's and 30's (no triumvirate of 12 year old girls this time...)
• The field was slightly smaller than I thought, 204 not the roughly 300 I posted earlier

As for my run this morning - I think I bit off a bit more than I could chew but I think it was a good experience. I ran on the Alpharetta Greenway which starts about a mile from my house and runs 10k (6.2 miles) along Big Creek. I decided that I would start at the Mansell Rd end, run an hour, turn around and run back an hour. At the one hour mark I was just passing the 5.5 mile mark. At this point I should have turned around but the draw of actually claiming I ran it from end to end to end (20k/12.4miles) was too inviting. That extra 1.4 miles made a big difference in the end... I should have turned around.

I completed the first 10k at 1:06:40. I noticed a slower pace after I turned around but I was still feeling pretty good at that point. By the 10 mile mark, somewhere around 1:50:00 I was starting to wilt pretty bad. My shirt now weighed probably 5-10 lbs and did not have a dry spot on it. My jog had slowed into the 12-13 minutes per mile range from the 11 minute per mile range I ran the first 10k in. I started to feel twinges in my calves and my hips started to ache as well. At the ll.5 mile mark I was doing not much more than a shuffle and finally decided to walk the rest of the way in. Funny how the body communicates that it has given all that it has to give. I actually arrived back at the end of the trail at 2:27:32.

Interesting things I learned about trying to run this length of run:

• I actually was running slow enough on the return run that I wasn't even winded - my problems were in my hydration and energy
• When I try to run that far again I will take and energy bar and Gatorade
• I need to get a running shirt that evaporates or sheds perspiration quickly
• Don't run that far less than a week after donating blood (huge type O and AB shortage here in Atlanta right now so I gave last week after my race)
• Don't let my ego define my goals - inside I knew 2 hours and 10-11 miles was as much as I wanted to chew off today.
• 4 ibuprofen work wonders when your hips feel like they want to fall off (kind of like when my wife was in that last month of pregnancy)
• And lastly, even fully 100% dehydrated I am still not under 200 lbs (200.8 at runs end) - oh well.

Now excuse me while I go and sleep the rest of the day until that BYU-UofA game this afternoon...