TXU Turkey Trot

Turkey Trot 10k:
Splits: 5:36,5:34,5:38,5:42,5:43,5:40,5:13pace for last 0.31(per garmin)
Time: 35:27
Place: 1st Master, 10th overall out of ~3000 (7th to the line but I guess a couple chip vs gun times lowered me down a bit - not sure why 3 fast dudes start 20-50 seconds late).

I was pretty excited to see a cool forecast for this race after a couple warm races recently and was pretty excited all week to run the race. I planned to try to hold 5:35 pace which seemed very doable and I kept it there through the turnaround at 1/2 way - but then into a little breeze I couldn't seem to hold it coming back and lost time on the 2nd half. I was pretty much alone from about 2 mile in and at the turnaround the next guy seemed a world away ahead and a pretty good gap to the guy behind too so no chance for a wind block for the return trip. For the last mile a kid caught up to me and traded off with me a couple times. Finally once when he passed and going into the wind I decided to tuck behind him for a bit then with about 1/4 mile to go I dropped the hammer and sprinted it in leaving him a few seconds behind (but he kinda got the last laugh holding a 21 second chip/gun time delta).

I was surprized to see the clock ticking away greater than my PR (35:11) as I approached the finish - I thought even with the wind I was at least sub35. Later looking at the Garmin distance I'm fairly certain there was an extra 20-30 seconds on this race being a little long so I'm feeling like I got the PR - and maybe even the sub35 unofficially. Not much master's competition in this race - main competitors were split between three main races around the city and I seemed to be the only one within a couple minutes at this race. After some reflection I'm feeling pretty good (not jumping off the walls great but pretty good) about the race although initially I was pretty bummed to not have crushed - or even edged out a PR from the race. I didn't stick around for the awards as I wanted to be home not so much past when the house got moving for the holiday so no idea what I actually won - guess I'll wait to get surprized in the mail - my expectation are very low.

Update - expectation exceded - Prize was a new Kindle - pretty cool!