Highland IL Memorial Day Biathlon & Lions Runs 5 Mile Run May 26, 2008

(Marvin) The Highland Biathlon: 5 mile run with 15 mile bike ride. Dave was unable to do this one because of work. I was looking forward to doing this one and trying to score an age group win this year. Unfortunately that morning on the trip there the clouds were dark and rain was pouring from the skies. When I arrived at Highland the it was sprinkling, but a heavier rain was on the way. There was a flash flood earlier that morning and some roads were under water. The bike part of the race was canceled although I would have been willing to do it, but from a safety stance I could understand why. When I found out that the bike part had been canceled and the race would be delayed for one hour I just wanted to go home. I stuck it out and did the race. If I knew that the biathlon was canceled I would have went to Herrin for the 10k and been able to talk with my fellow running friends. I haven't ran the Herrin 10k in 3 years. Now for the Highland race I was prepared to run a conservative 5 mile to have energy for the bike, but I had to switch gears to race 5 miles. I felt that I ran well until the last mile where I started to slow down. It was starting to get hot and muggy with the sun coming out. There is this other runner name Tom who is 51 years old. We are about the same speed and talked a little before the race. During the race I knew he was there behind me pacing me, or you could say stalking me. About the last half mile he passed me when I started to slow down. The bad thing was I didn't care. Usually I would have that competitive juice kick in, but not this time. Kudos to Tom then. I hope when I'm in my 50's I still can run that fast. My time was 32:38 first in age 30-34, and 13/155 I shaved off almost 1 minute from my run time of last year. I must say though my heart was not into this race.