Crabby -- hope the race went well! 

Trey -- hope your race left you in good shape for a LR tomorrow.

Russ -- good vibes for the right foot.

Dutchie -- enjoy that weather!

Well, I got in 17 today -- okay, 16.8.  It went, actually, fine.  You know what?  I think I might be able to pull this off. 

Not running though...but the break is good...next week will be better

Race report for Elizabeth River Run 10K : 

     I was concerned that my hectic schedule as of late would affect my performance.  Then I decided to spend 3 hours bent over sealing the concrete around my pool the day before.  It wasn't shaping up to be my best performance.  Come race day the weather was very nice.  A little too nice actually.  It was almost 80F by race time (8:00 AM!).  I wasn't feeling very confident standing at the starting line.  I was attempting to beat my PR of 44:10 from the same race last year. 

    The first mile I was clearly out too fast...6:36.  I reeled it in and got into a good rhythm...mile 2 - 6:57....mile 3 - 6:58.  Then everything started going south.  I was really feeling the heat and the soreness in my legs.  I muscled through miles 4 and 5 at just over 7:00 pace, but I wasn't happy about it.  I thought about giving up at the 5 mile point, but somehow managed to run through it.  I knew if I kept up my pace I could still PR.  At 5.5 you can see the finish and that was all I needed to pick it up through the line at 44:01.  Good enough for 6/46 for my age!  And my team mates came through and we defended the corporate title as well!  Not really the time I was looking for, but considering the circumstances I am satisfied with it.

Coming off 10 on Saturday and 3.5 on Sunday, my legs were pretty dead.  Plus I'd done something to my calf playing softball Thursday and it hadn't gotten much better.  Race temp was above 70, overcast with near 100% humidity.  After a little warmup jog of a mile or so I was soaked. My expectations weren't very high and they were met, although I wound up having a pretty good race.

 The race is run on an interesting, but challenging and technical course.  The first half mile runs steeply down into a minor league baseball stadium and then circles the perimeter of the field.  Did the first half mile at 8:32 which was right on plan.  The second half mile and most of the third are all up hill climbing to and circling a civil war fort.  Tried to push effort right to the edge, but still could only hold a 9:40 pace.  Any hopes of a PR  were done at this point.

The fourth half runs downhill past a science museum.  The plan had been to pick up to above goal pace here, but the hill had done its damage and I was only able to do 8:49.  Mile 3 winds through the old city cemetery.  And when I say wind, I mean like 20 turns of winding.  On paper, this third mile was all downhill and here was where I planned to really turn it on.  In reality, for every turn downhill, there was a turn back that went up hill and I couldn't hold the pace.  Mile 3 was 8:22 and the last tenth was a 6:48.  Final total: 27:23.  No sub-27, no PR.  Still, given the conditions, the course and my condition, I doubt that I could have done much better.