Ooooo yeahhhh OC art

Love me some demons inspired by monster energy and other popular canned drinks

Plus this doodle

First off as always I wants to wish all those who were injured on their run this Saturday a speedy recover and wish you all the best. Jason's Race Recap..... Talk about being amped up for a race.  I can't remember the last time I was so nervous for a race.  I mean this was the 2nd Half I've run and I knew what to expect so I figured it would be easy sailing, but my brain had other intentions and had me wired all week.  That being the case, I decided to play my 1st Soccer game of the season on Friday night, yep, the evening before the race to warm up the legs and hopefully relax a bit.  Well, the legs felt great after the game aside from the massive bruise on my left knee from a 60mph shot I was nice enough to block so that was awesome to wake up to Saturday Morning.  Now you have a little background, we roll into Saturday morning.  Up at 5:45am and out the door 15minutes later as I was very prepared for this race, gear wise, as I had everything out the night before and triple checked. 

This was where I completed (Major Error #1), I zoned out on eating my breakfast I had set out and didn't notice this until I stopped for gas.  So I settled for half a Cliff Bar and a couple fruit chews.  I also had my last Monster Nitro before a race.  I decided before this race that I was and am going to swear off these as I love them a ton, but want to ditch them as I don't think I really need them.  Here is the pic of my last Pre-Race Monster Nitro...

When I got to the Pre-Race area I was freezing.  I lucked out because I was able to wear my Sweatshirt and Windpants as my Brother-in-Law was there and was my sister and I's personal gear check.  I then completed (Major Error #2), I downed my giant bottle of water 30 minutes before the race start.  I have never done this before so after 2 trips to the Port-o-Potties before the race I figured it may come back to haunt me.  And so the race began... I was able to keep a nice 10 minute pace per mile for the first three miles and was feeling great and not tired at all.  I had planned to run in the 10 min per mile pace til around the 8-9 mile mark and then finish the last 5 or so sub 10 minute.  Well that all changed when I had to Potty Stop at mile three.  I had to wait for over 10 minutes before it was my turn and I just watched the field fly by and got more and more pissed off.  After I finished and was back underway I figured I could just run faster and make up the time if I ran 1 minute faster per mile for the rest of the race and then I'd be set.  That was (Major Error #3) as I failed to compute that would require me to run 10 Minutes faster then what my goal was.  My goal was sub 2hr 15min.  In order to hit that time, I would actually have to run a 2:05 pace and that was way outta my wheelhouse. I proceeded to run a bout a 7:30 minute mile from 3-4 and a 8:56min mile from 4-5.  This put me way off my pace and I was burning fuel like no tomorrow.  Served me right for not eating and keeping my frustrations about my time in check.  It was about this time that a good amount of runners were pulling up to the side of the street and talking to friends and family that had stopped to root them on.  While this was awesome to see, most of them did not look when the popped back onto the course and just jumped in front of people and racers would scatter to avoid them.  It was one of these nice folks that jumped out in front of me, and as I swerved to avoid them I rolled the ankle and felt it pop.  It was sore almost instantly but, I am a guy and have this bad habit of running though stuff I should probably take a look at but would rather not.  I pushed on, though hills I didn't remember being there and on through the water stations and got a extra boost when I say a friend from my soccer team rooting folks on.  I waved hello and the pain went away for a while and on I cruised.  I quit looking at my Garmin at this point and my goal was to just finish.  Then next couple miles all seemed to flow together and I basically zoned out as I do on some runs and hit cruise mode.  Aside from the ankle spiking a shot of pain here and there it wasn't bad until we hit the 10 Mile Finish and I saw all these folks get to rest and get their Finishers Medal and then realized mine was still a 5K away...and a couple major hills before the final sloping finish.  I didn't walk and fought walking up until the last hill.  The ankle just couldn't take it anymore and I had to walk about 50-75 yards to the top of the hill.  Then it was roughly 1 mile to the finish, downhill and off I went again and ran it out.  I finished and glanced at my Gamin and was surprised.  2:22:55...  Below is the Chip Official...