"By failing to prepare you are preparing to fail"

Rode to Austin on Saturday with friends, Jon and Cindy, and Doug. Dinner Saturday night at Macaroni Grill, with a group of 16. As this was "only a half", I'm not so stringent with my prerace routine -- but if this was a full, I probalby would have skipped the 2 hour dinner and opted for something quick and simple.

Back to the room, got my bib pinned to my singlet, D-tag(disposable chip) on my shoe, and was in bed by 10:00pm.

Up at 5:45 for a 6:45 am start time. The hotel was stayed at was about a 1/4 mile from the starting line..it was great. Except, the morning proved to be pretty windy..a little too windy for some of the barricades they had lining the course, so the they had to delay the start by nearly 1 hour. I regret not bringing my sunglasses -- with the original 6:45 start time, I didn't think I'd need them (sunrise is at 7:30).

I lined up with Jon -- a friend of mine in my age group, who I ran with a few times at some other events, and know through training at a local running store. We were planning to go out at about a 7:40 pace and see how it felt from there. This didn't last too long. I was feeling pretty good, so I ran a nice comfortable pace throughout --unfortunately, Jon's comfortable pace was a little slower than mine.

It was a windy morning, but luck would have it that in the point to point race that mainly goes northwest to southeast, the wind was from the NW. :) There were a few places where we turned into the wind, but not very many. The couse had some nice downhill sections, and a few uphills.

The race finished through the UT campus and the last mile was a nice gradual downhill.

I finished in 1:34:26, a 1:06 PR!!!!! (My previous PR was in April 2007). Yes, maybe this was a little wind/hill aided, but I'm a little older, and it's still a PR!

Besides the delay in the start, I think this event was very good -- and I'll probably be back next year!

Splits (taken at the mile markers on the course):

Mile	Split	Garmin Distance	Accumulated
1	7:11	0.95	7:11
2	7:48	1.05	15:00
3	7:01	1.02	22:01
4	7:03	1.01	29:05
5	6:32	0.96	35:37
6	7:29	1.06	43:07
7	7:15	1.00	50:23
8	7:21	1.00	57:44
9	7:24	1.00	1:05:09
10	7:19	1.00	1:12:28
11	7:10	1.00	1:19:38
12	7:12	1.00	1:26:50
13	6:57	1.00	1:33:48
13.1	0:39 (6:00/mi)	0.11	1:34:29

6 recovery miles with Darin at lunch. Both calves are still tight from Sunday's race. I hope to be back to 100% for this weekend's Texas "Goofy" challenge. I'm tentatively running Lake Benbrook Half Marathon on Satuday, and Waco Miracle Match Marathon on Sunday...we'll see if that works out.

AP: 7:55

60F, 10-15MPH N

!!HAPPY 7TH BIRTHDAY TO MY BOY, ETHAN!!

It's true, they do grow up so fast. I'm taking a vacation day today (using up my "use of lose" days from 2009). Got a few odd jobs around the house, and am going to Ethan's school for cupcakes at lunchtime.

Probably going to be a rest (no run) day..

2 easy miles on the treadmill...got off to use the bathroom, wasn't motivated to get back on. Decided to eat lunch instead. :)

25 degrees and a brisk 15-20 MPH wind welcomed runners this year. This is c-c-c-cold for me. I would have skipped this race if I hadn't already signed up. I picked up my friend Keith (who lives on the way to the race) at 6:45. Drove the 45 mintues to the race -- got our chips and went back to the car and waited for the 8:30 start.

Got to starting line just in time for the horn to blow, and we were off.

I didn't look at my watch once during the race. I was feeling OK, but just coming off a PR last weekend, I wasn't very motivated. I ran by feel. This is a small race -- maybe 300 or so. Got to the turnaround point and picked up the pace a little on the way in .. until I hit the headwind. With 2 miles to go a local ultra-speedster out for an easy jog came up to me and we started chatting. (Todd Reynolds -- he won the Cowtown 50K race last year -- just behind my 3:40 marathon pace group). Anyways, we ran together and he suggested we pick off a few runners up ahead. We passed 3 runners in the last few miles. When I was content on just coasting in -- Todd encourage me to pick up the pace. That was nice.

I finished in 1:39:20 (about 5 minutes slower than last Saturday's race) happy to finish -- and happy to get into my car and crank up the heat!

Positives - Got to hang out with some of my new running buddies (4 of them ran their 2nd half marathons today -- on their way to their first marathons at the end of Feb in Ft Worth). Pancakes, eggs, and bacon at Cracker Barrel after the race.