Friday, May 30, 2008

Celebrate America - The Results Show...

Ok, so the official race results were posted last night so I thought I would give you a breakdown. First off, I hate to argue when they IMPROVE my time by 12 seconds but there is no way my watch was off that far and my watch was within a second of the only split called out, at the 1 mile mark. The only thing I can think is that the course was actually more than 10k so they subtracted the distance and, based on your pace, reduced your time accordingly. Nothing else explains the 12 second change… Having said that, I guess I’ll take it! So, here are the numbers:

10 kilometers (6.2 miles) – 48 minutes flat or 7:43/mile (I timed 48:12 on my watch)
Runners: 478 doing the 5k, 457 doing the 10k for a total of 935 runners at the starting line(guess I can't estimate crowds very well...)

Winning Times: 15:38 for the 5k (at least I was less than a mile back at that point – just barely), 35:14 for the 10k (I was getting a drink in the middle of mile 5 about then…)

My Placing: For the 10k – 96th overall (my card said 98 so I'm guessing two unregistered runners went through the finish gate), 83rd Male, and 11th out of 48 35-39 year old men. Had I just run the 5k, my split of 23:10 would have been good for 76th overall and 8th for the 35-39 year old men.

Observations of Note: I lapped a total of 9 runners before they could complete their 5k. My improvement of 3:41 from my last 10k moved me up 69 spots in the overall and 15 spots in my age group. I ran almost the entire race within arms distance of a 59-year-old female who finished two spots and 14 seconds ahead of me when she pulled ahead on the final hill. Unlike last year when I think at least a half a dozen teenage girls beat me, this year there was only 1 and lets face it, if you run sub 40 as a 15 yr old girl, you’ve got a future in the sport! And you remember that kid I helped pull up the hill? I think that is him 1:29 behind me, 13 years old, taking 1st place in the 10-14 male category!

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