Notes
I had no idea what to expect today, but I knew I'd be happy If I broke an hour… so that turned into the goal. Had a plan to really ease into it in the beginning but got caught up in the flow of people and didn't quite manage it.
Ran the first few miles right around Culla, Kath and Larissa, but started to move slightly ahead up the hill starting in the third mile. Was feeling pretty happy with myself at the top of the hill when Kath flew by me and said "You have to push it on the downhills". I realized I was basically jogging. Thankfully she came when she did. I followed her for a while, but I pulled slightly ahead again on some of the uphills in the 4th or 5th mile mile.
During the 5th mile my legs were starting to get heavy and I got a little worried, but the miles from 5-8 were helpful. I wasn't hammering this stretch (which could definitely be hammered), but I did get my legs back a bit. At about mile 6 Kath caught up to me again (going down the hill of course) and we ran together until the 8 mile mark.
At the start of the 9th mile, which is also the start of the last hard stretch, I was close (20-30M) to group of five that included Longo and Pawlicki. I felt pretty good at this point and managed to get up to them on the first hill, and just in front of them on the second. That cost me most of my energy and I was just hanging on the last mile. But by that point I knew just hanging on would be okay.
I came across in 59:23 (84th place, 7th SRR, 40s PR after 1:00:03 in Newburyport this summer).
John and Jim were seconds behind. Kath (who helped me a bunch) came in right on the hour mark and Culla was 15 seconds behind her. I hadn't seen Culla since the 2 mile mark but he'd had Kath and I in his sights the whole race.
Overall, I'm pleased with the time, but I think that perhaps I could have gone for it a little more in the middle of the race. Just lacked a little confidence maybe. Of course it could have ended badly… who knows. In any case, I'm happy with where this puts me ahead of New Bedford, which is next on the list.