Sun 11/11 - AM 85 minutes incl. half marathon

Not the effort I was anticipating months ago when I entered this race, figuring it would be the capstone of the fall racing season. Instead, it became a cynical exercise in road whoring, in that regard no different from all the other races I've done in the past few months. After running the somewhat hilly 10 miler in late July at the end of a day at work, I felt it was reasonable to think I could maintain a similar pace on the flatter layout of this race given a few months to train for it. Instead, the coaching schedule worked its pernicious magic on me and I toed the line worn down. Not that the fall sandbag tour helped any of course, or the lingering issue with right calf that had its anniversary today. Clicked off three 5:30s to start following the eventual winner. Knew that this pace felt too strenuous and that the underlying fatigue was already asserting itself, but persisted in the hope the guy might die worse than I would in the later stages. Started to lose contact after 4 miles, pace slowed to mid 5:40s through 8. At that point I was completely alone and moved into place-holding mode. Next three miles went in 18 minutes, with the calf starting to twinge soon after 10. This made me scale the pace back progressively over the last two miles in an effort to avoid any disasters. More than get it over with mode, this was truly running cooldown pace before reaching the line. By the last 200m I was jogging it in. No shame really but the missed opportunity was a bummer. Squaring the demands of the coaching schedule with training doesn't get any easier with age. Had I forced the issue and somehow avoided straining the calf again, the time wouldn't have been any faster than 1:15. Striking to see just how much I've regressed since the end of the summer. It'll be interesting to see how long it takes to recover from it.