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.”