Dave's 10 Miler is "one of the oldest races in Ohio." I put that in quotes because I'm pretty sure its the race's tagline. I think I remember wanting to run it last year, but not enough to pressure Joe into driving out to Delta, which I thought was a lot farther away than it actually is. He was game for it this year and for $27.50 plus my favorite race shirt--a Nike dri-fit cotton long-sleeved tee worth $28 alone, it was a good decision.
Race start wasn't until 2:00PM so we got to have a late Saturday night watching Aziz Ansari's stand-up and then take it easy Sunday morning. It was less than a 45 minute drive to Pike-Delta-York High School, where we arrived around 1:30. We stayed in the car because we aren't big fans of mingling with the sometimes-hard-to-tolerate racing crowd. Everyone babbling about PRs and Garmins and Gu just isn't my style. On the way into the school we passed a woman stepping out of her car, dressed to run with a burning cigarette hanging out of her mouth. She looked so trashy but so ridiculous that I couldn't hold in my laughter. Seriously? Showing up to run a race with a cigarette hanging out of your mouth? There are so many questions to ask and judgements to make.
A little after 2:00 we were off and, as usual, we quickly separated. Joe and I just don't race together. I can be too whiney if I'm not running the way I want and I worry that if we were to try to race together I would end up being unpleasant. It was 35 degrees but "felt like" 25 so it was hard to dress right. Thirty-five is my cut-off point at which I prefer to wear shorts, but with that wind chill I couldn't. I wore running capris (it was a struggle for me to bring myself to buy them because I think they make women look stumpy) and my newest Nike Element jacket, which is really, really warm. I felt good for the first couple of miles, which I finished each around 7:30, but after that I started to get a little too warm. Also I felt like I really had to poop.
I'm not sure if the sweats I had were actual hot-sweats or poop-sweats, but I wasn't comfortable. I refuse to tie any kind of top around my waist because it's not 1994 so that wasn't an option. Also, under the jacket was my Chicago Marathon tech tee and I figured that I'd get too cold without sleeves. I unzipped my jacket and let it blow, annoyingly, in the countryside wind of flat, flat Delta, Ohio. With each turn out of or back into the wind I'd go from hot to cold to hot to cold. The wind was for realz. I determined about halfway through that there was no appropriate way to dress for this race.
At mile 5 I took a Gu from a race volunteer. I lucked out and got some espresso flavor, which was surprisingly good (I've avoided Gu for a long time and usually take Clif Shots instead). I think the delightfulness distracted me from the uncomfortable weather conditions for a while.
The first half of the race seemed to go by really slowly for me, but I think it was just the boring lack of scenery. The second half was way better and before I knew it, I made the final turn for the straight-away to the finish.
See that lady there in black? She was like, way ahead of me. I caught her and passed her just before she hit the mat, finishing one second faster. Go, me.
Official time: 1:21:06, 8:07/mile
(That lady: 1:21:07)
I'll add a picture of the race shirt when I get it out of the dryer. I've worn it a lot in the three days since the race and it needed a washing...
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