After taking yesterday off; I had a good run of 10 miles in the hills this morning.   We always stop at mile 6 for gatorade and regroup.  This morning the first 6 miles began at an 8 min mile and then we progressed down to low 7 min.   From 7 thru 10 we again did progression from 7:47 to 6:50.   Very pleased with those times considering the early hour, hills, and humidity.  It was only 74 degrees this morning but humidity was 97%.   My shoes are drying now in front of the fan in the garage. 

Have good runs all.

"Texans are tough".   Another way to say that might be "not to bright sometimes".  

Raining this morning again so this tough Texan went back to bed.   Felt good to sleep in for a change.   Will try for a tempo of 6 miles tonight.

I feel fortunate that I've never had to run much in high temps and humidity. It definitely takes more out of you.

4.5 miles today at work on the strawberry fields loop (they are mostly harvested now so I'll have to give this loop another name soon A good run--felt like I was flying kind of day, most of the way.

Where are our friends here? Seems to be a bit quiet.

Have a good night everyone.

Careful Fred.  That's what Forrest Gump said.

7.75 ez miles in the rolling hills this morning.  The race I thought was last Saturday is tomorrow.  So we will go see what kind of shape I'm in.

Good runs all

Simon, the thing with Clayton at Antwerp when he ran the 2:08 and it was such a big deal is that years later people tried to say the course was short.  It was a very fast course and by then no one knew where the exact start and finishes were.  He didn't take kindly to this kind of talk as you can imagine.  It was  a huge record at the time.

Since my track workout of Wednesday I have just run a couple of days easy, and tomorrow I will race a fiveK just to see about where I am, because I like to use that info to adjust track paces.  Maybe I will do this at 8 minutes a mile.  We'll see.  KS is getting worse weather than I am.  He is down south in TX on the Gulf of Mexico where it gets very hot and humid.  In North TX where I am it is 72 degrees in the morning all this week so I am pretty comfortable.  People don't run in the afternoons here in TX unless they are crazy.  I ran 36 miles this week with no long run.

KS, you inquired on KR about SS and where she is going.  She is loading up that van she bought and spending the summer just driving around the U.S. and Canada and visiting friends.  She will see Millbot in Utah, and WJ, Glider, Lad and others in Portland.  She just doesn't want to say too much.   Spareribs

"Spareribs, we'll give you a ten minute handicap."  

"Thanks," I said.  "I could use it!"   So I paid my money and went over to talk with my friend Terry who is a member at the Lake Grapevine club and he starts telling me about the handicap they gave him. 

I said, "Wait a minute!  This is a handicap race? I thought that guy was kidding me."  

So of course they have in their db my previous times at this race which I ran after surgery.  I think my first race there in November I ran a 10:24 pace, and eventually got it to 8:37 pace, but then ran another 5K elsewhere at an 8:32 pace.  I could have gone back and changed it, but I didn't when my two AG enemies, Scott and John showed up and I learned Scott, who is way faster than I am now, was given 9:45.  I have no idea what John's was.  Had this been any other race but the Carrolton race I would have immediately gone back and adjusted for my current best 5K time, the 8:32 pace, because my goal today was to run it in 8's.   But this race is very low key. Everyone gives back the trophies for example, and most of us are just competing with our AG friends.  I thought no more about it since Scott's handicap was so large and I figured overall they were probably about right..  We get some high school speedsters who run it in 16 minutes. 

So Scott and I and a few others hang around a bit after I did my 2.2 mile warm up and needle each other about handicaps.   The Saint ran to the race from the house, about 3.7 miles away and her plan was to run home after the race.  She got an 11 minute handicap.  So the race starts and they send people off in groups and there is all this catcalling of "CHEATER!" and stuff like that, aimed at the earlier groups to go off. 

When the big clock face counts down to 11 minutes off goes the Saint, and I follow one minute later.   At about 3/4 of a mile I passed her and she kindly mumbled "SANDBAGGER!" as I went by.  As I was running alone I had no idea what my pace was but I was determined to run this race in 8's and also not to go out too fast, so I was pretty pleased to look at my watch at one mile and see 8:08.  I was VERY comfortable at one mile. 

And I was comfortable at 2 miles with my 7:44.  So now all I had to do was pick off the slower people who went out ahead of me, and I got the last guy at 2.5 miles.  I ran just steady and fairly comfortably the rest of the way with no one near me, 7:59 for the 3rd mile and a kickless 47 for the final tenth and 24:39, or 7:57's for the race.  

Now here is the part I feel bad about.  Instead of the normal scoring with AG trophies etc. which is what I thought it would be, they gave a $25 gift certificate from a local running store!  I figured later on that if I had gone back and given them a more realistic predicted time before the race that I would never have won, but I didn't realize how they were going to do the awards.  They have never given prizes before.  The 2nd and 3rd place winners got running socks.  Of course had I done that, Scott would have won and he sandbagged almost as bad as I did.   

I ran the course again to cool down and when I came back Scott and some of my friends were sitting in camper chairs drinking beer.  We talked about that scene in "The Sting" when Doyle Lonigan, after losing at cards to Henry Gandolph, complains about not being able to tell Gandolph that he was a better cheater.   I talked to the RD after the race and told him I felt bad about the prize, but he said only that he was very happy to see how my running improved and that he was happy to see me running so well, so that is something.   Spareribs