I didn’t decide to run the Ft Worth Zoo Run 10k till about 2 weeks ago.  I had some friends and coworkers ask me if I was running and finally I signed up.  I haven’t done much distance running since my half-marathon in November.  Partly because I wanted to heal up and partly because I was just getting lazy in my running.  So I put together a two week crash course to get back close to the times I ran last year.  I focused mostly on speed work and hills.  I think I got one 6 mile run over the last two weeks.

I was up at 5am getting ready today.  When I walked outside I realized I didn’t wear warm enough clothes but no time to change.  So I froze until about a mile into the run.  I think about mile 2 the feeling finally returned to my fingers.  I started off at what felt like a pretty fast pace and after about two miles and a bunch of hills I wasn’t sure if I could sustain it.  I hit mile 3 and saw I was averaging 10:10 a mile.  I kept charging up the hills and stretching out my stride on the downhills to eat up as much ground as possible.

It was during a run up one of the countless hills I heard this guy comment behind me.  ”That’s one bad dude.  He doesn’t have any headphones.  He’s just rolling.”  I didn’t see anyone else around me at the time without headphones and I have shaved my head and I’ve got a goatee.  I’d like to think that he was talking about me.  Even if he wasn’t, it made me smile and made me push a little bit harder.

We turned the corner for the finish line and I had a little bit left in the tank and decided to sprint.  I saw the official time as I crossed.  Ideally I wanted to break one hour but I was only off by 51 seconds.  Plus I was close to my personal best.  I checked the official results online later and I ran it in 1:00:38.  I beat my personal best by 1 second.  I’ll take it.  And without getting a big head, I feel like “one bad dude.”