The Rowe Family Blog

This was my second year running the Spring Forward Distance Run. This year I had 4 friends join me. Mary wasn’t able to run the race due to a nagging knee injury. John, Mark, Bates, Corey, and I lined up together for the 8:30 AM start.

It was a perfect day for a race. It was in the forties at race start. The course is extremely hilly which is a double edged sword for me. I excel at downhill running but I think I’m rather poor at uphill running. Evidence of this is when I blow past tons of runners on the downhill to be passed on the next uphill or, often, on the flats. Mark and I played leap-frog through most of the race. We were actually trying to run together but our differences in speed over hills made that very difficult. I spent the last two to three miles struggling to keep up with Mark. Once again he pushed me to a better time.

Highlights from the race include:

• Near the end of the course Mark and I picked up our pace. Someone we passed asked if we had started the race late!
• A woman said we were making her look bad. That happened to be on a downhill and I pulled away even more. Mark told her it was my fault
• Closing a sizable gap in the last two tenths of a mile finishing only 1 second behind Mark
• Getting a new PR of 1:12:28 (7:47 pace) for a 15k
• Getting to see my friend from high school, Bates
• Knocking nearly 12 minutes off of my time from last year.
• Having a group of friends that accounted for 26% of our age group (19 people in our group)

After the race most of us went to John’s house for a nice afternoon eating fatty cow flesh and generally enjoying the sun.

Once again I had a great time participating in a race. Once again most of the fun was hanging out with friends. Running is an excellent excuse.