Oooohhh boy, I'm late with this one.
Anyway, this year was the third year we've done this race. We did it back in 2008 and 2009, but haven't done it the past two years. It's a deceptively tricky downtown course that begins and ends at Coors Field and you get to run the warming track before finishing, which is kind of cool.
It was a cold morning and, given that we hadn't registered beforehand due to finances/schedules, we briefly considered not running before dragging our butts out of bed, eating breakfast and driving downtown. We parked, registered, ran into my friend Liz, dropped our stuff back at the car and left again, ready to run.
We lined up with a vague race plan - one not quite as solid as the Cherry Creek Sneak - and took off.
The first mile is pretty fast - probably the flattest and we nailed it in 9:20. Mile two is deceptively crappy. It's fairly straightforward - only two turns - but it's ever-so-slightly uphill and has the water stop, which means congestion. We hit it at 18:40 - so holding that 9:20 pace, but I started losing Brandon at the uphill that ends mile two and starts mile three.
I was holding on at this point and couldn't keep up with Brandon. As we curled back toward the stadium, I let him go on ahead. I kept to the pace as best I could going into the stadium, trying to pick it up a bit on the warning track and then really kick it once I got back out on the street.
Just after I started my final kick, a guy next to me picked it up as well, probably trying to out-kick me.
Ha. Not possible, bud, sorry. I've chicked quite a few guys in quite a few finisher's chutes. You didn't have a shot.
Even better? I broke that 29:00 barrier and finished in 28:27 ... which I think technically hits my goal of a 28:00 5K, so woo!
Final Numbers:
Chip Time: 28:27
Overall Place: 525/2733
Gender Place: 181/1553
Division Place (F25-29): 42/213
Pace: 9:10/mi
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