I ran the 20 annual United Way 5k today. I think this was my 10th or 11th time to run it. It's one of the biggest 5k's in our area and usually has a good turnout of 450-500+ runners/walkers.Today was no exception. The weather was a little warm for my liking but really for a 5k it wasn't to bad 70's and sunny for the 9:00 start. I did a 1.5 mile warm-up to get the blood flowing and then it was time to toe the line for the start. I looked around to see who all was there and realized that it might be possible to take home the Gold in the Masters division if I could stay ahead of a couple guys that I knew that were in the Masters class. The gun went off and the race was on. As usual you got the younger kids going out wide open so it took about 3/4 of a mile for things to shake out so you could see what was really going to happen. A guy I know that has just started running within the last year (and has lost 46#) pulls up beside me. He told me latter that his goal for today was to beat me. I think he's about 30 so it shouldn't be to hard to beat this old man. All he really needed was someone to pace him so he didn't go out to fast. We went through the first mile right on target 6:09. I was shooting for 6:15. It's a flat and fast course with 2 or 3 turns each mile that slow you up a little but really a pretty honest course. So we're settled into a decent pace pretty much by ourselves with 3 or 4 runners about 10 yards ahead of us then 4 runners in the lead pack another 10 yards in front of them. We go through the 2 mile checkpoint with a time if 12:21 a little slower but right on my plan. In the third mile we picked off a couple runners as they started slowing down but I could also tell there wasn't going to be no kick for me at the end. With about .5 mile to go I told Jacob this was his time to shine if you've got anything left go for it. So he started slowly pulling away. I was really proud of him. I was able to hold on and finish 10 seconds behind him and bring home 1st place in the Masters Division. All in all I was satisfied with the race. 1.5 mile cool down. I'll call it a day go home get cleaned up and go back down to the riverfront and enjoy some Bar-B=Q and try and get rehydrated.
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