First Race Report 2010

New Year's Eve wedding was awesome. Kelley was incredible. She was really turning heads. And apparently all of my friends are drunk perverts. Wait, they are my friends because they are drunk perverts. Yes it took Kelley a month to put together her outfit. But since every conversation started with "holy shit Kelley is unbelievably hot tonight", I'd say it was worth it. The worst part is I only have a couple of bad pictures of us:

Me and Kelley are the white shirts near the table, top left. If I had any photoshop skills I would put in arrows.

Seriously. Drunk perverts. These are all of my idiot fraternity brothers that I love to get together with. Even the groom (Pat) is holding a beer. Leon (black guy on the right) lives in Romania now - it was totally unexpected and awesome to see him. I'm standing on the left behind the guy in the gray shirt.

I wish I had more pics to show off Kelley's true hotness on the evening. I'm telling you, it was a sight. Pat and his girl tied the knot, we all got really drunk at the reception and had a champagne toast at midnight. You'll have to email me if you want the more embarrassing stories. I don't hold back much here, but some things I can actually be discreet about (that means you Sarah).

Friday we drove back from Charlotte to Greenville, watched a bunch of football and played with the kids. I took a nap and tried to hydrate as much as I could.

seriously. bold. drunk. perverts.

Then saturday morning was the resolution run! This was a small, poorly organized race with no information available beyond sign-up online. We ran it last year as a training run suggested by Coach Katie for the Myrtle Beach full marathon.

As a quick aside, this year Coach Katie finished a drive back from wisconsin at 11 pm the night before the race, said she was only taking "a slow easy jog" this morning, and still turned in a 1:39 half, won her age group, 28/170 overall. Slow easy jog my ass.

Kelley has a cousin, Kendall (commonly known as G-Units) that lives near our house in Greenville. Kendall recently ran her first 5k (and is hooked now - her husband is also a Cat1 Bike racer) and talked Kelley into doing the 5k race here with her. Since I'm battling the Snail in a half distance in a few weeks, I wanted to do the half again just to prep up. This route is quite hilly, tough terrain, and I knew it would be a challenge I was up for. Last year I ran it in 2:21:28 for what turned out to be my Half Marathon PR on the year.

In the end, the Gangsta's won their age group in the 5k! They finished one right after the other as you can clearly see in the pictures, but the official times have them 6 seconds apart. For Kelley to get an age group win is huge! She didn't PR by time, but said the course was great. Kendall's husband was the only one taking pictures, and he passed these on:


The girls with their hardware! I'm so proud!!


My report on the half: Have you ever had flat escargot? Come on down to Tybee Island Feb 6th to try some. I'm going to stomp the snail flat. I set a big PR on this one, turning in a 2:13:48 time. My goal was really 2:10:xx or better, but I'll take 2:13 and an 8 minute PR over last year.

The course started out running through downtown Traveler's Rest, SC. Since I had to bring all of my running gear from Raleigh to Greenville for the race, of course I forgot half of it, including the garmin. So I have no idea how fast I started off. But it was pretty fast. The first mile marker I saw was for mile 3, and we already had a few hills. I went what felt like a half a mile past that marker before taking my first walk break up a brow beating hill. It was cold cold really freaking cold, so I didn't break a sweat until mile 2. But that steep hill brought on the walk. About a mile later I started up the tunes and dropped a glove. They were expensive and a christmas present, so I had to go back maybe 200 yards and pick it up.

The course tools around downtown TR for a while, then heads over to the Furman University campus. I love running on campus, so this was very familiar ground for me. The campus entrance was around the halfway point, I saw a mile 7 marker on campus. They had a por-o-let at the entrance, so I jumped in. Fortunately it was quick and I wasn't wearing a one-piece tri suit.

The last leg hits the Swamp Rabbit Tram Trail, which thank goodness was mostly paved this year. Last year it was still all gravel and horrible conditions. This year it was paved sweetness. My legs really started feeling each step at this point, and I think my pace started to slow some. I was still passing people, and I texted kelley at the end of the trail so she'd know I was about to finish. She met me at the finish line with her trophy in hand. My final stats, 2:13:48, 10:13/mile pace, 117/170 overall 8/11 ag.

So my target is to take 13 minutes off of that time and break 2 hours at Tybee. How can I do that in just 32 days? Well I lost a few minutes to the glove, and easily 5 minutes to poop. Replace the hills of TR for the coastline of Georgia and it gets easy. I should also note that this was my longest run since the B2B, and I'm going to get in some 14 and 15 mile long runs between now and then. Endurance comes before speed, and I'm going to need some endurance for 2010.


Kendall's kids also both ran the Fun Run in the race, and the older kid took 3rd place overall! Here's a shot of all of us with the hardware. Kelley and Kendall have their AG trophies, the kids both have medals plus the big ones 3rd place. And I got a finishers medal. Sexy huh? I know the headband/gloves/black-blue-gray combo is a real winner.

That's actually not snow on the ground. It was 22 degrees at the start, warmed up closer to 30 by the end of the day. My northern peeps (we call y'all yankees 'round here) can feel free to laugh. But we think that's cold! it's the coldest temps we've seen here in years!

So overall it was an awesome weekend and a truly unbelievable way to start out 2010. I am convinced now that this whole year is going to rock! I love New Year's, it's one of my favorite holidays. Everyone gets a fresh start. A new race season, a new clean training plan and training log. It's time to set goals and plan your year. Pick your races. Pick your schedule. Time to buckle down and have some fun! And this was an incredible way to start.