Friday night, after a really slack week of [non-]exercise, I made my way in afternoon traffic to Zilker Park for the Fila 4 x 2.5 mile Relays. What were we thinking!? My car thermometer reported a temperature of 105 as I drove down in the bumper to bumper crush, and I was already pretty nervous. I had done a good job of hydration all afternoon, and finished off a glass of Powerade on the way down, so I had done all I could, but I was still antsy.
I parked near the tennis courts on the north side of Town Lake, and grabbed a water bottle, along with my driver's license (more on that later), and jogged gently over to the soccer fields where the race would circle. It wasn't a problem getting "warmed up," that's for sure! Still, the humidity was really low, so it was fairly tolerable, all things considered. Some of my fear went away...but not all.
I found the Gazelles' tents without too much trouble, and chatted with everyone as I waited on Frank, Jan and Brad to arrive. They had parked at Brad's house, which was nearby. I didn't have long to wait, and after signing my life away on the waiver, Frank got our race chips for us. There were a lot of familiar faces in the crowd, and we were all just laughing about how crazy we must be to be there in conditions like this. It made it easier to deal with the race, knowing that so many of our friends were dealing with the same thing.
Jan set out for her warmup with Brad, and I stashed my driver's license in my t-shirt up in the "rafters" of the tent. The race was supposed to start at 6:30pm, and I was the second leg, so I figured I'd start my warmup about 10 minutes before the race start. On schedule, after telling Jan I'd be there for her when she finished, I set out for a nice easy warmup. I made a big circle of Zilker Park, going backwards as the course was set up, figuring I'd see the runners as they roared into the first leg of the race. Not so. Turns out, by the time I finished up my easy warmup and my striders, the race hadn't even started yet. Oh, well.
They finally sent everyone off at 6:50, so with that in mind, I went off with Richard and Ward for a couple more striders to finish off my warmup. We took a break to cheer on the runners as they stormed by, Gilbert in the lead, and then knocked out the last couple of strides. Richard and Ward were both running the second leg, as I was, so we found the proper corral and waited our turn at this deal. They had music playing on the loudspeakers, so it wasn't easy to hear the announcements of the incoming relay team numbers, but I made my relay handoff with Jan without difficulty. It was time to run!
I had checked out the course on paper while hanging out at the Gazelles tent, so I had a vague idea of what was ahead of me. I had resolved to "run how I feel," making sure I didn't blow up and have to walk in on this short race. The initial part of the course was very familiar from running 2000m repeats here so many times, so I was comfortable with my course knowledge to start with. I also decided that my only real focus would be to count the people that I passed, and also totalling those who were able to pass me. Something to take my mind off the stress of running, right?
Anyway, down the short hill and then into the setting sun, I eased into a running gear. My legs felt like rubber initially, just like at the Silicon Labs marathon relay on July 4th, so I didn't panic, and settled into a solid pace. We turned up the nice little hill to the turnaround point at Barton Springs Road, and I tried to enjoy the shady part of the course. Coming back down the hill, the trusty GPS told me I had covered the first mile, so I had some idea of where I was in the run. I passed a woman pushing a stroller at that water stop (I skipped that stop), and was up to 13 people passed, with two people having passed me. So far, so good.
The second mile featured a long, steady but modest incline through and around the Nature Park. I shifted into hill climbing gear, taking shorter steps, and was still passing a lot of folks through here. I got caught by two other guys on that stretch, but I caught a bunch of folks myself. As we reached the last water stop at Barton Springs Rd, I grabbed a cup to drop over my head, and continued motoring along. I felt a little beaten up by then, but the peer pressure of the team event kept me going.
I pushed up the hill on Barton Springs, catching a bunch more folks, and finally crested that bad boy. That was a huge relief. From that point, I knew the course was a downhill work of art, so the mental stresses went right away for the most part. My totals were at 23 people passed, and 5 guys had caught and passed me. I focused on the work at hand, and pushed hard down the hill, catching 3 last people before I entered Zilker Park for the last time. I roared around that last corner, and enjoyed the last bit of downhill running. Well, I enjoyed it as much as you can enjoy something that's causing you to suck down oxygen like that race was doing. Gilbert was there about 200 yards from the finish, yelling at me to push hard to the finish, so, obedient as always, I kicked down into my best gear, and pushed all the way to the tape. I had no problems hooking up with Brad, and my work was done. God, that was hard!
I was struggling to catch my breath as I strolled out of the handoff zone, but it was sure nice to be done with that run! My numbers were 7:18, 7:40, and .4 miles in 2:37 (6:32/mile pace). The leg was supposed to be 2.44 miles, so I might be cheating myself a few seconds per mile, but what the heck. 7:20/mile average pace was well off my current 5K PR pace, but given the conditions, I'll take it.
My throat felt like I had ingested a couple of bugs or some dirt clods. It must have been the dust or afternoon debris in the air, but we all felt like we had something caught in our throats. I drank a bunch of water after the race, but it didn't seem to help all that much.
Once I was done, I checked in with friends and foes, and we were all glad to be finished. I saw Bernard roll across the finish line, capturing first place for Gilbert's team, and then Brad finished our third leg and handed off to Frank. I grabbed Brian, and he was nice enough to accompany me for a nice easy cooldown jog. That really helped me, for sure. We cruised through Zilker, and ended up near the top of the last hill, where we could watch our teams finish up. It was fun to cheer people on, now that they had just the downhill finish ahead of them. We saw Thon, Frank and Rachel zoom by, and then we jogged back through Zilker, talking about music as we made our way back to the main race compound.
After congratulating everyone we saw, including a very happy Alex (he smoked his leg of the race in a big way!), it was time to grab that free cup of beer that was awaiting us. Grabbing my driver's license (see, there was a reason for bringing it!), I went to the beer garden and enjoyed a very frosty Shiner Bock draft. It was a hefty 16 oz of beer, and it went down very nicely. Rachel, Brian, Alex and I finished off the beers, and we were quite happy indeed. Not goofy, but pleasantly relaxed.
We laughed a lot about knowing that we had a long run that was starting in less than 12 hours, but figured we could always just run nice and easy if we got in trouble. Rachel, Brian and I walked over to our cars, in the dark, on the trail, which was pretty surreal. What a day!
I got home about 9:30, and gobbled some food, along with a bunch of water and such things, trying to fix myself up for the long run on Saturday. After all the sweat output in the heat, I'd be a little low on fluids in the morning, but surely it would be okay?
We finished 10th in our division, by the way, just ahead of another Gazelles team (Brian, Emily, Amy and Rachel). Gazelles swept all but one category first place positions, so it was a good day for the herd!
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