Wasn't quite sure of my choice to run a race this morning when we awoke at 5 to our neighbors still partying from the night before. The good thing was that I felt pretty rested, even though I hadn't planned on getting up until 6. I puttered around a bit, got dressed and decided to head over to the race around 6ish, after I dropped a few movies back at Blockbuster. Since it was up in Alpharetta, it was a little bit of a drive. Stopped and got gas, then headed over to the parking lot where the registration tents were set up. Picked up my number and my shirt. We were lucky that we could hit the movie theatre bathrooms, rather than the usual portapotties. It was about 10 minutes until the start, so I headed over to wait as the crowd began to form.

With the help of a friend, I had set up an advanced workout on Garmin so that I could try out the whole 'stay on pace or I'll beep at you' game. It pretty much beeped like crazy at me for the first mile. I always go out fast! But I did try to hold it back a little and stay on pace. One thing I didn't figure out is if you can still hit the lap button at the mile markers, or if that would screw up the set workout. It made it much harder to go back and remember my splits since I had a .5 mile run, 1 minute walk set up to repeat 12 times. I used SportTracks though, and got pretty close.

Anyway, Mile 1 was 11:49 but I'm counting it as 12:09 (I hit the start button, but it didn't start so I had to hit it again, and I'm estimating about 20 seconds from when I actually started to when the watch began). As we headed into the second mile, there was a nice downhill on Northpoint Pkwy to a right turn on Haynes Bridge Road and then a right onto Mansell. Mile 2 was 11:50 and then we headed up the largest hill of the route, not really that bad at all, pretty short really. The rest was mainly a slight downhill and flat to the finish. Mile 3 was 12:11. Since it was a 2 loop course, if you were running the 10K you had to turn just before the finish (ugh, cruel!) and then head back out. I was dragging a little because the sun started feeling hotter, but hit Mile 4 at 12:31, on the very edge of my goal pace. I think this pushed me a little to speed up since I was watching my average pace climb and really wanted to see if I could keep it close to 12 minute mile average.

The next mile included that nice little downhill before the turn onto Haynes Bridge - Mile 5 12:13. At this point, I was feeling pretty good and decided that I could push it a bit in the last mile. I pushed up the hill with Garmin beeping at me to speed up, which I did. I felt pretty good and watched the average pace drop, which was fun. Hit Mile 6 in 11:21 and the last .2 in 2:31. 75:00 Clock Time; 74:46 Watch Time. Woohoo! PR over my last race by a little over 6 minutes (official time). (Although I still think the Shamrock was a little long, but my 6.2 time for that was 78:46, so 4 minutes!)

Had a banana and headed home feeling a little nauseous, but I think that was the Nuun. I don't think I can handle the bubbles in the Nuun - which is a bummer because I love the idea!