A good day

Today I ran 20 miles (minus 1) in a very interesting way. A good friend of mine, who is on track to qualify for Boston BTW, wanted to run 20 today so in true old-school-Willie form I said what the heck and agreed to join him. The running club had a series race today out at Lake Overholser so we wanted to do that race also so we combined them.

The race started at 8 AM so we figured we could meet at 6:15 run 1 lap of the lake (8 miles), stop and pick up our timing chips, run 4 more, then start the race to get the last 8 miles. Good plan!

The first lap went well and we stopped to get our chips. We were a little behind schedule but figured we could still get 4 miles in and make the start on time. So grabbed out chips, strapped them on, said hi to some friends and took off again. This is when Willie's stomach decided to act up. Actually my stomach let me get 1.5 miles away from the starting line before it got my attention. I quickly found a porta-potty but this ruined our schedule. We were hauling butt back to the starting line and got to within a few hundred yards of it before we heard the gun go off.

So we started our race 2 minutes behind the walkers. Ooops. It didn't matter much since we were on a training run anyway but it was weird coming through the walkers. We got many a confused look.

My buddy was able to pick up the pace and move up through the pack quickly. I, on the other hand, was really feeling the 12 miles we had just done and couldn't keep up with him. I was very content to run with the back-of-the-packers since I knew most of them anyway. Hell it was only 1 year ago I was with them! Loved it!

I made it with negative splits to about mile 17 where I found this wall thing. It was a big wall. BIG WALL. Did I mention it was a big wall? Well it was. I fell off the pace like a rock. That's when I noticed the remaining E-Gel in my Race-Ready shorts pocket. Ooops #2, forgot to take that last one a few miles before. Too late to take it now, wouldn't kick in until I was done so I just pushed through the wall to the finish of the race. This got me to mile 19, 1 short of my goal. I tried to keep going after the finish, I really did, but I couldn't. I was dizzy and a little out of it. Screw it, I'm done. I walked to the truck and put on my pants and a new shirt. Did I mention it was cold? It was cold. I was cold. I didn't like being cold. So I got warm. Then I got food! They had big fluffy muffins at the finish and hot apple cider.

Needless to say I didn't win any medals today. I was too far back from the start. Once I figured this little fact out I was on a bee-line to the nearest Starbucks! Mmmm Starbucks.

After all this excitement it was College Football time! And beer. Way to go Iowa! As much as I love the Big Ten (Go Buckeyes) I really wanted Penn State to get beat. They are good but just don't belong in the top 5. The Big 12 and the SEC are so much better this year. Oh and Alabama almost got knocked off too!

Is this a perfect day or what? I think I may explode.

Thanks for listening