Hard race this morning. Had a great night at the hotel and an evening visiting with Rob. I had decided to race today in my "fat man" shoe, Brooks Beast because of a lingering Achilles tendon injury that I had felt a bit through the week. The race started out well, although it was humid and I was drenched by mile 3. The roads were pretty slick with my worn shoes but the pace was feeling OK. Miles splits were 5:25, 5:23, 5:27, 5:33, 5:23, 5:35, 5:21 and then I crashed going around a right turn about 7.4 miles. It tore up the knee pretty good and I walked a bit trying to assess what to do. I felt all right, but pretty winded. I couldn't decide for a bit what to do with the leg and there was no medical in sight. I started running again and held about a 6:12 pace through the mile 8 marker and that was it. I knew that race was done. As I walked Rob came on by and looked great. I was hoping he would get that 1:14 he was shooting for. Since nobody was around and I decided to walk the course backwards and see if I could find a ride back or a medical van. Tons and tons of people, wow! Never went down a course backwards before. After two miles no sight of assistance so I decided to start jogging and make it back to the hotel. The knee felt good enough now that I was pretty depressed about dropping out. I pretty much knew I should have continued. Oh well. This race will take some time to place in my mind. A few miles from the start line a medical van going to the finish and gave me a ride. They insisted that I go for stitches so I had the pleasure of finishing the morning getting 4 stitches in the knee.
Crap. Still don't know how I could have ran this morning. Probably not at the pace I was at, but you just don't know. Mile 8 is about where the half marathon race begins. Time to find another one to train for. | 