Barber to Boise weekend

Let me preface this blog by saying that I didn't get nearly enough sleep this week. Between celebrating my divorce being final on Tuesday, Monica's Birthday #1 on Thursday and Monica's Birthday #2 on Friday, I was running on fumes.

Beautiful day for Barber to Boise. Ran into Jon Hancock before the race and warmmed up with him, which I enjoyed immensely. We always have some good laughs and crack each other up. My legs felt decent enough and after my 1 AM snack of blueberry Pop Tarts and Powerade, I only had a mocha for breakfast before the race.

I knew that it was going to be a fast race as there were a contingent of young guys there and the Greater Boise guys as well. The gun went off and I found myself feeling decent, but only in about 15th place a half mile into the race. At that point I started racing and picking off some guys. I hit the mile in 5:24 (slower than I thought that it would be) and was probably in 12th or so. I continued to feel decent and picked off a couple more guys and hit the two mile mark in 10:59. At that point I was starting to feel some fatigue in my quads and the lack of sleep and the mental effort of racing escaped me. I was just putting one foot in front of the other at that point. I held my position though and no one caught me, so I ended up 10th overall and was the first runner over the age of 40 (actually would have won the 35-39 age group as well) in 17:14.9 (5:33 per mile average).Liz had come to watch the finish, so after the awards we ran back to her car, so all together I got in an 8mile day. I wisely went home Saturday and crashed by 11 and slept like the dead.

Sunday morning dawned clear and cool and I met Derek at his place in Garden City and we were quickly on the green belt.He ran the first 13 miles with me where we averaged about 6:45 pace. I dropped the pace after he quit, running 6:16, 6:22, and 6:30 pace. The Garmin measured the distance at 18.54 miles, but I'm going to call it 18.0 miles in 2:00:59. if that's the case I averaged 6:43 pace which bodes well. I felt decent and finished strong.My quads feel a little beat up this afternoon, but that's normal.

Planning on doing the first 20 miles of the Tri Cities Marathon next Sunday. That will be a good indicator of my fitness.

Thanks to everyone for all of your support.

Dave