This morning was the infamous (that means more than famous) Clean Air 5k. Last year Linmark messed up the measurement of the course - making it a 4.9k, much to the chagrin of more than just a few local runners.
The morning started out nicely - sunny day, a bit warm, but nice, really. I met up with some of the ole Red Rovers - Amy and Justin. Barb and JP were supposed to show, but overslept and missed the race. My co-worker, Stacey, joined us as well - making our team three redheads strong.
I didn't really know what to expect from myself in this race. My training hasn't been great lately. If you've been keeping up, I've been complaining about how I've slowed down quite a bit - albeit unintentionally.... and there has been absolutely NO speed work going on. Plus I ran yesterday. Running two days in a row is not something I usually (read: hardly ever) do, so I wasn't sure how tired my legs would feel. But, as always, I would try my best.
Registration pick up left a lot to be desired. They had no safety pins for the bibs - so the race folks were telling people not to bother with their bibs - and just to be sure they wore their chip. Ok fine. I overheard one runner ask someone behind the registration table what time the race began. He did not know. *Sheesh* Top notch race organization.
I forgot my watch, so I had to rely on the course timers. The first mile marker was the only one (besides the finish) to have a timer. Mile 1 came in around 8:05. Mile 2 felt about as fast... maybe 3 to 5 seconds slower, but who really knows. Mile 3 I was tired. The sun was beating down and I really felt like my legs were beat. As I crossed what I thought was the finish line, I naturally slowed down... that is until I heard people in the crowd yelling to keep going, that the finish was, in fact, a couple dozen more yards away. Turns out Linmark never removed the chip timer mats from the start of the race... leading the runners (including me) to believe that these were the mat-timers for the finish of the race. Not so.
Fine.. no biggie - maybe I lost a second or two in the slow down. I crossed the finish line with a clock time of 25:30. Wondering what my chip time is? Yeah... so am I. I checked out the results... and I'm not there. So maybe I'm just making this whole story up - and I didn't really run the race. There is no proof that I did. Looking at Stacey's results, it looks like her chip time was about ten seconds faster than her clock time... so given that we started together, I guess that applies to me too. That's as close as it looks like I'm going to get to knowing my actual time. Good thing I didn't really have my heart set on doing well in this race.
After grabbing some water, I found Stacey and we ran out to pick up Justin and his mother who were power-walking the race. Sadly, Justin did not beat the penguin this year. Don't worry Justin - you'll get him next year.... not so sure I'll be there to see it though.
Warm up - 5k - and cool down.... probably about 4.25 miles.
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Wow, some races never quite get it right. I know that most of us are racing for fun, but come on--no pins? Only 1 mile marker? Leaving the start mats out?
I feel your pain. I guess this goes to show that last year wasn't a fluke. That 4.9k was annoying. We would have done it this year, but my wife was out of town.
I'm doing the Wall Street 5K run next month in NYC. In 2006, it was 2.9 miles. In 2007, it was 3.0 miles. I'm hoping that just maybe this year is 5K.
Rest up and good luck at the Leigh Half.
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