I was a little apprehensive about the race this year, since I would be going into it about 10 lbs heavier than I have been in more than a decade. I place the "blame" on weight-lifting. No, it isn't all muscle, but you have to be in "caloric excess" to gain muscle and so I would say the extra weight is about half muscle and half fat. Either way, it is weight that needs to be carried around and the cardiovascular system is the limiting factor--or so I thought.
Since 2007, with one exception in a very hot race day, I have been running between 44 and 45 minutes for the 10K. This year, I went in cautiously and did not go all-out but still ran 44:44!
Here are some pics.
At the start, nervously clapping after the national anthem.
The lady in the plaid dress and I played cat & mouse the whole way: I thought I had buried her around mile 4 when I opened up a big lead after she had been 100 yards ahead of me. The 5k and 10k races joined together in the last mile and a half and I really blew my pace from dodging the slower runners. She finished about 50 yards ahead of me based on time--I didn't see her at the finish and my guess is that she went in with the 5k runners.
Passing slower runners in the last half mile.
Photos from Jim Rhodes of CoolRunning.
Added:
Shots of me and the woman that beat me at the finish:
Added: If you look at the second picture, you will see the woman who came in immediately before me and also a young man with a red shirt and sunglasses. In the final picture, you can see this same man behind me in the final stretch. It made me think that we didn't need to run 10k when we three were already together at the 1k mark.
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