Notes
Mill Cities Relay! Ran the anchor leg for the co-ed open team. Between getting Jake and Mary to the start of their leg and driving over to my leg, I only got to my leg 10 minutes before my projected start time. I quickly got out of the car, switched out clothes, and ran probably 3 or 4 minutes as a "warmup". Kept the tights on since my body never really got warm.
Felt pretty good starting out and thankfully no real issues with the IT band or plantar. Felt pretty fresh honestly. I wasn't too worried about not warming up cause I did the same thing at Cigna and still ran well.
Had some people ahead of me to work towards so I tried to keep an honest effort and work towards them. I was going to be faster than them just because I'm on a co-ed team and thus starting farther back. But still nice to have people to catch.
Uphill in mile 3 really wasn't too bad. Started later than I thought and was very gentle. Kept an honest effort and felt strong coming up the hill. 5:49 pace for that mile - not bad. My neutral gear wasn't the best coming down the other side of the hill but still sufficient. Once I got into the city I was cruising. 5:24 for mile 4 and 5:15 for the last 3 quarters. Last straightaway (1 quarter mile) was 5:07 pace.
Afterwards my calf didn't feel too great but cooldown wasn't too bad. I'm pretty happy with how this race turned out. Especially after that crappy last XC race this was nice to see I can still race well. Hopefully I can stop having so many life obligations, my IT band and plantar can go away, and I can get consistent again.