Monday, August 10, 2009

Saturday morning confession time




Saturday morning, I overslept and missed the start of my group run. Seems that I need to whack the alarm clock silly a few times for it to reset itself. I set it for 5:00, but it did not go off, or maybe I slept soundly with the darn thing blaring in my ear for an hour. It could happen, and has before. So, I got up, decided I probably needed the extra beauty sleep anyway, and decided to ride my bike on the route my friends were running. Lotsa time to take pics, and get a few miles in the saddle in the books. Click here for a report on the RW blog.

Next on tap was a 5K trail race over at Keystone. Actually, this was a duathalon, with a 15K bike ride sandwiched between 2 5K trail runs. I would love to get into some serious mountain biking someday, but I have a hybrid which tough trails would eat up. And, I admit I am a little more serious about getting a good road bike before getting an off-road toy. So, a short 5K was on tap for me.





Brian Franklin, the race director did a superb job putting this together. Brian is the owner of Double Shot coffee, by far the best espresso obtainable in the city of Tulsa.
Local beer and hotdogs awaited the finishers, and since I was doing the bunny race, that meant I had gratification much sooner that the hardcore participants!

My buddy Wade ran the same race, and PR'd in a major way. He ran 23:23 on a hilly technical course, finishing 13 minutes ahead of me. I would blame the time difference on youth, but he is not all that much younger than me.

The start. There were far more people in the full Du, than in the 5K. I started near the back....OK, I started dead last. Nowhere to go but up. See the little dude in the colorful jersey? I put a big bulls eye on his back, and intended to blow his doors off.

There were lots of switchbacks early in the race. Make no mistake, these guys were a good 1/4 mile ahead of me.

A mile into the race, I ran into Robin who was acting as course marshal, making sure no one missed this turn.Robin ran with me for 16 miles at the Arkansas Traveller last October. She is getting quite good at knocking these 100 milers out.

I would have for sure blown through this turn without these guys helping out.Tried to talk this guy out of his shirt, but to no avail. Our race shirts were white, and the red would not have shown blood as bad.

It was work, but I finally caught this guy. A tactical move on my part....get them to pose for a picture....let me catch my breath as I was wasted from running him down.

A brief moment of indecision. When in doubt, trust the arrow.

Actually, the course was very well marked.

I finished 6th place overall, and 1st in my age group!! Not my best time by any means, but considering I just treated it as an easy run, I was happy with it.

Hot dogs at the finish line.Hot babes at the finish line too!And MMMMMMM Coffee!

Ok, I guess I need to come clean. yes, I was 6th male overall, but there were only 7 males in the 5K. I'm ok with that.And if this guy hadda ran, maybe I could have beat him too.

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