Notes
Gil Dodd Invite at St. James in Wheaton. Was 74, a bit humid, and windy- not ideal conditions but not terrible and honestly not a huge factor IMO due to doing most of the workouts recently in warmer weather. 25th place in 26:31 which I'm pretty stoked about- goal going in was to be between 26:40-27:10 so ran faster than the range I had given myself previously. Also wanted to be top 50 and beat as many conference guys as possible and did really well there as well.
Goal before the race was to get out decent the first mile but stay really smart through 3 miles and then start moving in the back half of the race. Executed perfectly. Splits were 5:17/5:24/5:24/5:24/5:01 (5:17, 10:42, 16:06, 21:30, 26:31). Caught 24 people the last 2 miles (11 on mile 3 and 14 on mile 4) and didn't get passed by anyone so that was a positive. Position wise didn't sprint off the line great but also didn't try and get out balls to the wall since I knew I wanted to chill. Position was never an issue- found a good rhythm and generally was more so getting passed by people the first 1-1.5 miles vs passing. Focused on staying smooth, breathing, and gradually picking off anyone coming back. Through the halfway point was probably in the 60s but people were starting to come back and I was starting to make up ground. Hit the 3 and mentally said it was time to start moving and just started counting off one guy at a time. Really had to talk myself in pushing the last mile as I was hurting a bit but was able to catch a big pack within the last half mile and move past a lot of guys. Had a pretty strong kick the last 150 but was a pussy and didn't make an all-in move at 400 like I wanted to before the race- probably cost me a good 5 seconds and another 5 guys.
All that being said- I'd give myself an A. Great effort, smart race plan, and good execution. Could've pushed more the last 400 but besides that, good race and solid close.