Sun 12/14 - AM 75 minutes incl. 5k in 16:30

AM - Walter's Run in Westie. Ran the course once as a warmup, then the first 2+ miles at 5:45 pace after that. Ideally it would have been the whole thing but I was right up against the start of the actual race and so I had to cut it short. Neither the warmup nor the "tempo" piece felt especially good, dragging a bit as expected from yesterday's higher volume. Blustery wind didn't help either. The first mile of the race was of course far too fast, just over 5 minutes, as I let myself be dragged out by the early leaders. It felt like garbage on the initial gradually uphill stretch. Took the lead during the second mile to burn off any pretenders, that got rid of all but one guy who took the lead back just after 2 miles (10:23) as we hit the only hill of any consequence on the course. I thought my goose was cooked, neither of us were running fast at all by this point. Sensed I could take it with 800m to go, made a move after we stopped going uphill which some would call a "trick." The trick worked as I was able to coast in keeping the guy in second at arm's length. Finished feeling more exhausted than I would like for the pace we were running. Cooldown was a 20 minute crawl. Nice write-up of the race here I made sure to get in a mention of my specially created shirt.