First of all, I want to send a big "Congratulations" to my dad for finishing the Nashville Half Marathon in 1:50 and some change. With that time, he qualifies for the start corral at the Chicago Marathon this fall and has really put the pressure on me to do the same. Great work! UPDATE: The official results are in and Dad finished 13th out of 399 in his age group.

This morning I had the CARA Lakefront 10 Miler, which was the first race that I've ever run. I started out running with my running group, which was nice because it kept the pace in check. Actually, I think that we went a little slow and I left the group after 5 miles and went on my own. Here are my splits:

Mile 1: 8:34
Mile 2: 8:34
Mile 3: 8:34
Mile 4: 8:35
Mile 5: 8:36

At this point (halfway), I was at 42:56. Since my goal pace was 8:28, I was 36 seconds behind and knew that I had to pick it up. This is when I left my group.

Mile 6: 8:25
Mile 7: 8:29

The way that the course was set up and the wind was blowing, we ran downwind for the first 1.5 miles, then into the wind for the next 5.5 miles, then downwind for the last 3.5 miles. So, now I had the wind to my back and really picked it up.

Mile 8: 8:06
Mile 9: 8:19
Mile 10: 7:55

Total: 10 miles in 1:24:13 or 8:25/mile.
UPDATE: My official time was 1:24:13. I finished 26/60 in my division (Men 25-29) and 356/1270 overall. Not bad!

It was a little warm, pretty windy, and we got rained on for a few minutes, but I'm really happy with the race. I'm most excited because my wife, Karee, got out of bed with me to come cheer me on. There weren't many spectators, so it was especially nice to have here there cheering for me.

For the next race, I'm not going to go out nearly so slow. I would have rather run a consistent 8:26 or 8:28 than have to run so hard the last three miles to make up time.

Now, I'm resting. Next time I'm also not drinking any wine the night before the race.

Today: 10 miles
This week: 28.54 miles
2009: 446.5 miles

Shoes:
Trance 1: 336.33 miles (retired)
Trance 2: 23.19 miles
Trance 3: 19 miles

Yes, I retired the original Brooks Trance's and bought two new pairs that will hopefully get me through the summer and fall marathon training. We'll see.