Spectacular light show this morning. Sky above me was clear, but several miles away were some big cumulonimbus looking clouds. They were lighting up with lightening which didn't seem to reach the ground. Sometimes you just saw light, other times you could see some pretty spectacular bolts of lightening across the length of the clouds. It was pretty far away and not getting closer so I figured it was ok to still run. I hadn't done a tempo run for a while so I thought it was time. I headed out from my house and ran the first 0.5 miles with Jenny before I split off towards 54 and Starkey blvd while she stayed in the neighborhood on phone duty. I had trouble getting going at first and actually stopped a couple of times so I could start up again and hopefully shake off the dead legs. It worked eventually and I started to feel better. Just over two miles out, I was ready to begin. I knew the pace would feel hard especially at the beginning. So, here is what I did:
6:57, 6:48, 6:54, 6:41, 6:37 As I thought so, the first mile felt hard. The 4th mile didn't feel any harder than the first mile, perhaps a little easier. The 5th mile was better than the rest, maybe because I was glad to be done. Not sure why the first mile is always harder than the last mile. After the tempo portion, I slowed down and gradually picked up the pace as I recovered. The last mile for the morning was at 7:14 pace, which felt pretty good. Average pace: 7:35 I received a surprise in the mail today. It was a medal from the Estes Park Marathon for finishing 3rd place, male age 40-49. The overall winner was in my age group, so that opened up a spot for another award. I know some people don't believe in age group awards and some people don't believe in awards due to someone getting bumped up, but I sure do, because the award is sitting on my counter! It was very nice of the people at the Estes Park Marathon to mail this medal out to me, thank you!
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