FETZER 20k and 2 mile

The Fetzer 20k and 2 mile were yesterday. Jace (my son) really wanted to beat his time from last year which was 15:14--7:37 pace. I was most concerned that he had a good time and a positive experience. I'm not one of those "everyones a winner and gets a medal" type of guy. However, one bad experience can cause a 9 year old (or someone at any age for that matter) to not like it anymore. Driving out to the race I told him that we have to have fun and like it no matter how we finish otherwise these things aren't worth doing.

After we ran around the lot, up and down the road a little bit (warming up?) we found the grandparents and I left him with them as I had to get to the start line. I wasn't able to see Jace race because the 20k that I ran in started first. It went women 20k @ 9am, men 20k @ 9:12am (it was an 'equalizer'), then all the 2 mile racers at 9:15am. So, when I was about 16 minutes in, Jace was most likely crossing the finish line. Here's a shot of him (click for larger view):

The next time I saw Jace was when I was about the 12.2 mile mark (just .2 to go). I saw that he had a medal around his neck. Once I finished, he and his grandma found me. He showed me the medal and it was 1st Place age 9 and under. He then told me his time, which right away I thought was wrong, I heard it wrong, or that he just said the wrong time. He said "Thirteen thirty three." I was like: "What?!". You mean "Fourteen thirty three?" He said "No, that's what grandma said." It was correct! He ran a 2 mile race at a 6:47 pace! Crazy. Jace was 4th OVERALL of 55. The course was dead-on as it wasn't certified, but they measured it as if it was. Plus, the winner can ran sub 6's for a two mile and he (overall 2 mile winner, Matt Schrader) did so. [The 20k--which was certified and measured on Joe's (Moyer) GPS at 12.43 (exactly 20k) so I am sure the 2 mile was right.) Hopefully you can make this out--I scanned the results from the 2 mile (click on it, then zoom or click on it again):

Now the 20k
Back when I first looked at doing this race I wanted to run at the same pace as my one and only 1/2 marathon which was around 6:35 pace back in 2008. That would have put me at 1 hr 22 minutes for the 20k (12.43 miles). Over the last two weeks I revised that and decided I wanted to run a steady 7 min pace which would have had me finishing at 1:26:59. Well, first off, I forgot the GPS pod for my Suunto HRM.....so, pacing was going to be based on feel, heart rate and the mile markers and me hitting 'lap' at every marker. (BTW, every mile was marked! Nice.) Their is a pretty big climb in the first mile. I ended up going out too fast and ran the first two miles around a 6:30 pace. Then I settled in at 6:40-6:45. Everything felt good. I ran wearing a Fuel Belt and drank about 20 oz of homemade Pina Colada Sports drink which worked beautifully at race intensity. It was around mile 8 that I started to feel the consequences of having done relatively no high intensity race paced running yet this year. Right groin pain, left foot and left knee (ITB area) pain started in... Mile 9 was around a 7:00 pace, then we made the last turn around and it was one path to the finish. I saw that a group was only about 45 seconds behind me. All along my plan was to up the pace at about mile 10. I tried. Mile 10 went at a painful 6:40, but I had to back off. The last two miles were pure pain, but I had to just keep going. I finished at a 6:44 pace (1:23:34). Needless to say, today, I'm a wreck !

CLICK there > (Yep, HERE) for full results.
Click THIS for Tom Woo (T-Woo's) pictures of the race.