Lots of action this weekend!
Sand: rough day, but it had to feel awesome owning the lead!!
Gruecd: You didn't expect much, so certainly not all that bad. At a minimum, it was a nice training run, and when you are feeling better, life will be easier.
TheThird: GREAT race!!! Being with, then beating your Buddy is priceless!
Wraith: Awesome 14 miler!
PmBrown: Your speed progression has been fun to follow!
TheMan: Getting 6 at pace is great. Without a taper, it's not realistic to expect more from your legs.
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My Race Report:
It was a GREAT all-around day and night. I got up at 5:30 and started to get ready for a 6:00 expected time of departure. I was driving all 7 (three other couples and me) of our neighbors (and best friends) to the race. At 6:35 I got a text from one of the couples asking if they could throw their kids on our sofa to have Mrs. Liquors watch them, as BOTH had sleepovers that they didn't make it through. With the Mrs. still snoozing (= no veto power!), I of course told them "yes." They brought them over right at 6:00 with the youngest (3 y/o boy) screaming as he came in = waking the Mrs. and both of our girls = "bye honey, have a great morning!"
The drive was a blast, as the three who were running their first race were pretty darn nervous and we had fun giving them crap. We all got to the start line by 6:55, and it was literally the first time in twenty years that I started a running race with the goal of running WITH (instead of against) somebody else. Even at the start, nobody knew who would be running with who. When the gun went off, we all ran together for the first half mile, when the other three guys took off. I stayed with the three girls 'til the first mile (10:15) marker, then picked up my pace to hopefully join the boys. By mile 1.5 I caught up with two of the guys and they said Chuck went ahead as he's going to stop at the next porta-john. I ran with them through mile 2 (9:15), and then took off to catch Chuck. As I was going, they told me not to wait for them, as they wanted to go their pace. Chuck wasn't far ahead, and with only 800 people running, he was ez to find. He decided he could skip the porta-potty, and we kept a consistent (8:55 p/m) pace through mile 7. At the rest stop, around mile 7, there was a band playing, and I realized that ALL the volunteers AND the band were students of mine, and ALL screaming my name as I came in!!! I told Chuck to go ahead, and I high-fived all of them, beat the drum, thanked them and had a blast with them for approx. 30 seconds. It was awesome!!!
I then took off to catch Chuck again. That mile is literally the steepest hill in our entire area (it's where I do my cycling hill work), and I decided to take it on as hard as I could, as my HR was still very low. I ran it at a sub-8:00 pace and caught Chuck at the very top of it (HR was still only 171!!), after passing probably 100 people, which also felt pretty awesome. Chuck said he felt great, and that he wanted to try to go sub 2 hours (his PR was 2:02). We were about a minute behind 9:00 p/m pace with just 5 miles left = quick math told me that we needed approx. 8:45's to get this done. A gorgeous
coed overheard us talking about trying for sub 2:00, and asked if she could run with us. Being the gentlemen we are we wiped the drool from our mouths and told her she absolutely could. Chuck's knees started to bother him at mile 10, and I could see the pain in his face. My HR was slowly getting lower after racing the hill and I couldn't have been enjoying "just running" much more. We lost our coed during mile 10 (I'll iStalk some photos when they are in) and amazingly passed a 10 year old kid (that looked 7!!). I could tell he was struggling, and gave him a gu, and told him that I'd see him next with his medal on at the finish line.
Miles 11 to 13 were lots of work for Chuck, but we were passing quite a few people as we were running a steady 8:45 the whole time (to put it in perspective, his fastest "long" run was at 9:41 pace). It was great finishing with fresh legs, while watching others struggle. I played the role of "cheerleader" for everyone we passed, and thanked all volunteers along the way. My HR went down, EVERY mile after racing the hill, which is certainly a first. Coming into the finish, Chuck literally had nothing left in the tank. We crossed the line together and we shattered his PR with a 1:57:09 (8:57 p/m; 9th out of 21 in AG). My highest HR was 171 (running up the hill), and my average HR was 158, with it being 159 as we crossed the finish line. To put it in perspective, the last marathon I ran, my average HR was 176, and max was 185. I'm pretty positive I could have run the course again at the pace we were running.
Chuck laid down, and I went to see the others come in. The other two guys came in together at 2:07 (9:39 pace), followed by two girls at 2:12, and the last one at 2:17. Two of the girls hadn't run as much as a mile in the decade prior to starting to train for this, and everyone ran much faster than they anticipated (the guys expected to run a 2:10, the first two girls 2:20, and the last 2:30). Had I PR'd (wouldn't have happened with the shape I was in), I could have taken 2nd in my AG = a goal for next year! Realistically I would have most likely run approx. 1:44, which would have been 4th.
Mrs. Liquors, with a house full of kids (9 in total by the time we got home!!), found a way to make an amazing brunch for everyone. We drank and ate straight from 10:30 am until 7:00 pm, causing me to skip my scheduled bike ride this morning. My legs feel great, by head feels about 5 sizes larger today
Edited to add: the 10 year old (with his medal on!) came up to me after the race, offered to replace the gu he "borrowed" (I declined) and thanked me for helping him finish. His dad also thanked me, and took a picture of us. His final time was 2:02:41
for today's race reports........
Heading for the airport here shortly, and if everything goes as planned, I'll be back home mid-afternoon. Looking forward to a nice, sunny 5-mile recovery run with temps in the upper 40's. 
Fun report! Great day!!And nice race pics of gruecd. lol It does look like a photo-shop in the crowd pic. In the other, he's his usual, focused self. Nice.Day off today - first day of spring break for the university. Yoga; 100 lunges; 25 pull-ups (small sets); 90 minutes on the bike trainer. A good morning. Heading out now for a blood platelet donation.
I found the ones online, but if you could send me a hard copy, that would be awesome. I'll text you with my address. Thanks!
I might run a 5K in Grand Rapids (my hometown) on Saturday, April 24, which puts me closer to the Pinckney area to get there Saturday pm for packet pick-up, et al.
