So I’ve made the effort to get back in shape… As part of that, I had to do a baseline race so I can judge my progress. I’ve really only trained for a couple weeks now, but I was still pretty happy with how I performed. I was shooting for sub 24:00, and managed to pull off around a 21:58. Official results will say around 22:02, but I started near the back and Caitlin timed us at 5ish seconds to pass the start line.<br/><br/>I started with a good night’s sleep, a yogurt in the morning, a bagel w/ ham and swiss for lunch, a bagel snack around 3pm, and a Clif Bar around 5pm. Over the course of the day I drank around 4.5L of water. Awesome!<br/><br/>The run itself was silly hot; the bank read 105 degrees when I passed it on my way to the event. Very well put together event (for a Thursday), I’ll be running with those folks again. Good organization, efficient results, and free snacks afterwards! I’m thinking they need some help with their website, though, it has broken links everywhere. Maybe that’d earn me a free membership? :wink:<br/><br/>I had a plan in my head to go for 7:30 mile pace, but that was out the door when I rolled through the first mile in 6:51. I had no idea what I was doing, I thought I was going to die and look stupid. Instead, I messed up my timing (hit stop instead of lap on my watch) and didn’t get my time for the middle 1.1 miles, but I managed to close out with a 7:04. That means the pace for that 1.1 miles was 7:20. Not ideal splits, but certainly not bad either considering at the halfway point I grabbed water and was surprised with a nice splash of gatorade that just wouldn’t leave my mouth. Note to organizers: water only on short races!<br/><br/>Caitlin was shooting for sub 26:00 and managed a 23:58 so we both exceeded our goals quite a bit. Unfortunately, she’s still 4:30 off of her PR and I’m about 5:30 away from mine. Had I been in the shape I was in 7 years ago, and had she been in the shape she was a year ago we’d have likely placed 1st male/female. Oh well, such is life. At least we’ve got something to build from now…<br/><br/>Also of note, the 1st place woman finished right in front of me by about 3 seconds. The previous year (not 100+ degrees) she had run a minute faster. She either got a good amount slower or the weather was worth approximately a minute. Until other results are posted, I cannot do any further analysis than that. I’m really hoping the weather was worth a minute, though :tongue: <br/><br/>Oh yeah, I placed 38th out of maybe 125 runners. I think Caitlin was 60th and around the 8th female by my crappy count (it was an out and back, I wasn’t really counting).