NoHo 5K X-country -- Tue. July 17

Better weather this week, though still hot and a bit muggy. Went ahead with my "loosen up by biking over" plan, and set out in good time for the 10+ mile ride along the bike trail (mainly -- it peters out in residential NoHo and I had to find my way from there to the town center, and thence on to the Gardens for the race). Ivan there, and also Colin B., still doing doctoral work at the uni -- I'd not seen him at any gathering before, but it turns out he took up running abruptly and in 9 months had done his first marathon. Now he's done two, and will be doing (he hopes) the Tokyo 2008 -- how cool is that?! He said if he could do it anyone can -- whcih is what people say, but I _still_ just can't see it. Ouf. This Sunday I'll take another crack at the 20-miler I failed on last week, perhaps.

[note to self -- must run Friday as no run on Saturday, thanks to HP activity!]

Anyhoo, back to the race: a bigger field, 103 people, and I had the same tussle with the same guy -- overtook him and others at one mile, started losing a few places at just past 1.5 miles, then he re-passed me at just past 2 miles, and I just tried to keep up after that. Came in 18th enfin, 10 seconds behind:

Time: 20:28
Speed: 9.2 mph
Distance: 3.1 miles

Comment: the splits are very revealing: mile 1 = 6:18, mile 2 = 6:05, mile 3 = 7:16, and then a fast finish (11 mph instead of the average 9.2). I'm happy with mile 2, of course, but the big fade is too big - -I need to even it out a bit, keep more push for the 3rd mile. Problem is, the toughest bits of hill are in mile 3, so it accentuates fade. Still, to get all three miles in the 6s would be a good target. Maybe next week.