I found the perfect way to get highly motivated for this race; on Friday evening I watched Stephen Furst run a 13:47 5k to win the event at the Raleigh Relays.  It was an amazing performance on a cold windy evening and perfect motivation for this race.

 

It was still chilly and windy at the start of the race which was probably an improvement over last year when it was quite warm and humid.  My training for the last couple of weeks had gone very well so my goal was to try to maintain 6:10-6:15 pace until the greenway, hold pace as best I could through the greenway hills, and then pick it back up on Hillsborough.  And that was basically how the race went.  By mile 4, there were three of us that ran together until the greenway where, unfortunately, I dropped them from behind.  Through mile 7, I stayed on pace and came through 10k at close to the same time as my final time for the Cary Distance Festival.  As with last year, the bagpipe player at the top of the final hill on the greenway should get some type of "hero" award.  I was able to pick up the pace as we returned down Clark and Hillsborough but, unfortunately, I could not close the gap with the two runners that I had been with earlier.  Much of the last 3 miles is downhill (compensation for the uphills on the way out) but this year was into the wind.  This course also has a long downhill final stretch which was really nice since I could see that it was going to be really close as to whether or not I could break 1:22. 

 

Overall, I was very pleased with my performance which was a "second career" PR.  I actually felt like I had "raced" the entire distance which definitely helps build confidence as I begin the final two months of training for the Vermont City Marathon. 

 

Great job to David  Maurer and the other RRO runners!  There were a number of really strong performances by teammates.

 

After the race, I went out to Umstead to cheer on the folks running the 100 miler.  Their completing that distance makes a half marathon seem pretty short!