Sat 9/29 - AM 70 minutes incl. 10 mile road race

Not a fun experience between the ongoing cold symptoms, sore calf, and continued gross weather. Feeling listless from the moment I woke up, even though I slept better than expected given the sore throat that usually keeps me tossing and turning. Lack of motivation continued right up to the start of the race, as warmup was perfunctory at best. After cruising through last year's edition of this race at marathon pace and still winning with ease, I had hoped the field would be just as mediocre this time around but no dice. Ran as quick as I felt comfortable with to try and burn everyone off, still got passed at 3 miles ascending one of the gradual hills in the first half of the race. Gave up on winning right there and spent the rest of the race trying to hold onto second without killing myself or straining the calf. After getting through 6 miles in around 34 minutes, the next three miles were each over 6 minutes as the course turned uphill in earnest. Realized to my chagrin with 2k to go that I was being stalked, and even though it made absolutely no difference in the grand scheme of things, I picked up the pace drastically on the last mile to hold the guy off. The gradual downhill nature of that last mile makes it go by quickly no matter what but I ripped it off in 5:18. I wish I could say the previous slower miles were a tempo effort but given the elevation gain they certainly weren't. The amount of effort put forth wasn't immediately apparent, but when I tried to do a cooldown afterward I found it impossible to move at even a slow jog. Thus it became more walking than running. Went home as soon as humanly possible and took the first of two long afternoon naps. Calf felt stiff the rest of the day. I'm sure this will delay the full recovery from what currently ails me but hey, at least the NVGP is in the bag.