Notes
This race went better than I was expecting. I didn't get a warmup in since it was pouring and I didn't have much for rain gear along. So I ran down to the starting line a couple of minutes before the race and got soaked right before it started. The race started out quickly and I knew a couple of good runners were there (Nate Hopp and Nick Bowerman) so I didn't want to let them get too far ahead. Slowly worked up to them by the mile marker as we crossed in 4:59 (They even slowed up 3/4 mile in). After that Bowerman and I started to slip away from Hopp while settling into a little more comfortable pace. We talked about training for the next couple of miles and at about 2.5-3 we stopped talking and went back to race mode. The course was just an out and back with a couple of gradual inclines but nothing I would really count as hills. I wasn't sure which one of us was really feeling better and was planning on just waiting to kick at the end since I knew Bowerman has been running well and didn't want to make a foolish early move, but then he gave me a couple steps on a hill around 3.5-4 miles so I decided to see if he was actually hurting and attacked the rest of the hill. He was and I put 10-20 meters on him by the end of the hill. I didn't want to give him a chance to get back into it so I kept attacking pretty hard at the top and didn't look back until the next corner. When I looked over more shoulder I was surprised to find I couldn't even see Bowerman anymore. I got back into a smooth rhythm and ended up winning by 44 seconds (Pretty sure he just shut it down after I took off). I felt pretty good on a big increase in mileage and was happy to finally break 26:00 in a 5m/8k. The rain was fun too and didn't give me any blister problems.