Notes
Race started right at 8 which was nice. I managed to jump the concrete wall right as they were letting us approach the line, too (good timing, though I still had to stand around for 10min).
I was only maybe 15ft back from the start, so I got off well and quickly marked a larger Raytheon (our rival) guy so I could draft off him. The first mile or so was into the wind; the forecast had said 20-30mph, never heard anything official though. But early on, though noticeable and I made many efforts to draft, it didn't feel too bad.
Already there were 3 Raytheon guys ahead of me, with 3 of my own team ahead of me as well (4 score). I had planned to run with our 3rd runner, but he was speeding a bit more than me. I just tried to keep my pace.
At about 2 miles, another teammate of mine came up next to me, but then he just kept on going. He was going far too fast I thought, and within a mile I had passed him thanks to hoping onto 2 other guys. That pack got me past our 3rd teammate (who also seemed to be suffering) and to the 5mile. Halfway was hit in about 27:10, or about nearly a minute faster than Capital Pursuit. I felt just as bad though.
I slowed in the 6th mile, but did pretty well to maintain as we looped back to the finish. Miles 7, 8, and 9 were just mentally tough as I forced myself to push. I had no idea where my teammates were but I knew we need to have a great top 2 and a decent fourth as I was not catching the Raytheon team.
Then shit hit the fan for the 10th mile. It was nearly all into the wind and I was not near anyone. My pace slowed dramatically and every attempt to pick up the pace hurt a lot.
Thankfully, our front 2 guys were in the 52's (about a minute slower than last year) and our 4th guy managed to stay just a minute behind me, and we ended up beating Raytheon by 20sec (total team time). Doesn't get much closer than that!
A positive split is rarely fun but I pushed hard. It's not the race I wanted but I think my fitness did show I could be under 54min. I also need to be more careful about eating next time. I rarely race except where I have friends, so staying in a hotel and having many free meals was quite the adjustment. My stomach could have felt much better on raceday.
Splits and 1 last remark: So I've been racing with a GPS watch starting this summer, and for the most part it's been good, it ensures I don't miss any splits and I can monitor my pace. Today, however, was the first time I continually got my splits well before the road signs. At first I didn't care, I figured it would even out in the end, but it just continued to get worse. The problem was that I was happy with the splits my watch gave me, but I should have been changing pace due to the road signs. So in the end, I got my 10 mile split 30seconds before the race ended. 30secs isn't much, but it would have gotten me well under 55. I'll need to reevaluate how I do this going forward.
5:23
5:20
5:31
5:24
5:23
5:33
5:26
5:31
5:30
5:46
then 31 more seconds.