Our Course!

So last Thursday our race was at our home MTA course. For some reason, our coach invited Cony to the meet, so instead of just going for a good time, I was now going to have to fight off Will Lundquist.

Going into the race, besides beating Will, I was also going for a sub 17:31, which would get me the Junior Class record for our course for people on the MTA xc team (dating back to 1994 at least)
Since it was our course, I had spent the last 2 days planning on how I was going to run it. I knew that I always run a really good race on our course. (last year I ran faster on our course than I had at EL the week before) I also know that the first mile of our course is extremely deceiving as it is basically flat.
Will and I went through the mile mark at a 5:04ish, I knew that was fast, but I also felt really smooth and comfortable, and felt like Will was pacing which made it easier. When we got to the first mile, I "took off" and got maybe 20 feet ahead of Will, I then stuck ahead of him. When I reached this short steep sandy downhill near the mile and half cut, I took off and put more distance ahead of Will.

I went through the two mile mark slower than I would have liked, but sub 11, which is very good for me. Unfortunately the last mile is one of the last, you have to go up a paved hill, through a bunch of sand, and up a nice rocky hill. I personally love that last rocky hill, and is usually where I manage to lose or get by quite a few people there, and when you get over the hill it's all downhill.

I didn't have the fastest sprint to the finish, but it wasn't bad. I managed to come through the line at a 17:12. 9 seconds behind Will's record that he set just last year, and fast enough to put me as first for Junior's and by 19 seconds.

Our boys team won by a lot. Sadly, our girls team got defeated by Brunswick (for the first and only time this season) because our top 2 runners did not run.
After the race, around 7:30, my stomach started hurting, and by 11:30 I could no longer stand it, my dad brought me to the ER and I was diagnosed, well all they really found out was that it wasn't apendicitis. And I was dismissed around 6. On our way home, my dad decided to tell me that maybe I should get stomach aches again if it will cause me to run that fast.

The 17 minute barrier

This past Friday we were at EL. We knew that this was going to be our hardest meet so far, and possibly during the entire regular season. Both our guys team, and the EL guys team were evenly matched, and we knew it would be a good race.

Going in to the race my goal was a sub 17, and a side goal of beating Faisal. I knew to do this I would have to go out with Faisal, and then probably try to out sprint him to get me under the 17 minute barrier.

The start of the race was rather surprising. The starter told us "okay, so there will be two commands, runner set, and then Go." so we all lined up and he said "Runners set" then maybe one second later says "go" and that was it, we were all taken a bit by surprise, but still got off the line pretty quick.

At the beginning of the race, it was Faisal, Hussein, and I running together, and then as we crossed the driveway, Faisal made a move and I went with him. It was then Faisal running a bit in front of me, with Hussein falling behind. Faisal went through the mile mark at around a 5:02, with me close behind at a 5:10. I then pushed ahead and almost caught him, but then he managed to also push a bit after I had settled back into my pace. I came through the two mile mark around a 5:34 (much better split then last week) and by then he was probably 10 seconds ahead of me. I knew I had to make a move, and tried, but failed. Looking back, my coach was able to figure out my last mile was a 5:20, and the last .1 was about 41 seconds.

For those of you very good at math, that brings me in at a 16:45, second, but breaking 17. By quite a margin. Which felt amazing!

Looking at the team standings, our boys team got 2nd by 4 freaking points! we know though that in the future we can beat them, because our number 3 Jake, had a bad day due to allergies, and so next time we face them (KVACs) we should beat them easily.