Notes
8 people in the 5K and about 45-50 in biathlon.
5K people are in front of the biathlon pack. When Splitmaster asks the 5K only people to step up a young guy with a long ponytail and multiple tattoos looks around and pumps his fist while telling his wife/sister??? "yes". I guess that is the guy to beat. Have to keep an eye on this joker. Looks to be in late 20's-early 30's and looks to be in decent shape although a little big in the upper body to do LOTS of distance work.
Not sure what to expect on this one. Decided to go over on Thursday night and have not done any intervals/ "Speed work" ( or one min sprints) since the Nolan Weber heatfest. Doubt it is going to feel very good ---- dead on with that prognosis.
We take off and ponytail is smoking the crowd for the first 600 m. A youngish 20's tall guy comes cruising up from behind and passes me. I know he is in the biathlon portion. Brian Davis pulls up beside me about 1/2 mile in. He is also in the biathlon and and pretty solid runner. At the half mile mark ponytails is 12 seconds ahead of me and I am running at 5:55 pace. Tall boy is right behind him then me and BD. This will get interesting about 2 miles in as I am guessing ponytail is in for some major hurt after coming through the first mile at 5:40.
Climb up the big hill on the course about 1.6 miles into it and all three of us cut into ponytail's lead. He is fading fast as we climb. At the 2.1 mile mark all three of us, Tall boy, myself and BD who is right behind me cruise by ponytail as he is officially sucking bad air.
As we cruise into the Choate area BD passes me about .3 miles from the finish. I tell him good job; he says he remembers me beating him the last race. I tell him Father Time is now kicking my ass and go get it. He goes ahead. As we near the bike transition point it is Tall boy, BD and me. I start to sprint about 50m from the turnoff point and run past BD and am about 10m from Tall boy as he turns in. I finish the final 50m under the Splitmaster mat. Finish time = 19:16. Splits: 5:56/6:21/6:18/41 sec for final .13 mile for low-5 min pace.
Ponytail hasn't showed up at the 25 min mark in the race so I start my cooldown. Delbert tells me he came limping in and said he "popped his knee". I said he was having some serious lung issues when the three of us passed him but his "injury" must have happened after this as he was running without a limp when the three of us blew by him.
First 19+ min finish on a course since 2013 XC course at Osage Center. Father time really did kick my as$ today.
Received nice custom-made wine bottle with OA champ stenciled on it to use as a bookend for my one last year. I think this is my third OA at this event. Placed 5th the year I did the biathlon event.
Another 5k OA win although the smallest race I have ever been a part of.