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Purple Stride 5km RUN

June 9, 2018 (Morning)

Exercise Type: Run

Weather: 70s and plenty humid

Comments:
For the third consecutive year, I agreed to run this race, but this year I finally found an excuse to just run it and not race. Marc Tracy was running and not walking so I went to the start with him and his girlfriend Amanda and decided to just help pace him. We were well back when the gun went off (10 seconds) and I fought my instincts and ran beside Mark. First mile was 7:12. Second mile marker wasn't seen, but Marc did accelerate a little before the halfway point of that mile as we did the 180 turn on Constitution Ave. The 2nd and 3rd mile turned out to be 13:59 as Marc worked hard up Penn Ave and the final .1 mile was 38 with a spirited kick. We crossed together in 21:50 according to my watch and 21:52 according to the chip in 26th and 27th places among men. I thnk Marc appreciated my rambling banter and overbearing motivational talks during his race, but he was pretty wiped out and not really chatty afterward and I had the feeling he might have rather run it without me in his ear. Still, I was impressed and felt that my "pacing" him was a decent rational for not pushing myself to race. Mostly, I was just scared to race because with the better training I've had this spring, I was afraid I'd be disappointed to be slower than I was last year when I had less training. Basically, I wimped out because I feared I'd race too slowly. Now, two days later, I'm trying to convince myself to make a training plan and try to get into good shape by late July. (I'm not sure I've convinced myself to care. For one thing, I'm really tired of having this strain in my lower right core and how it leads to very tight hops and lower back after every run. What's that about and will I be disciplined enough to start doing core work more than once a month?)