Iroquois Hill Runners Thanksgiving Day Run Report

A couple of items to get to before you see the new content.  The first is my continued plugging of my charity for the 2014 season:

I wanted to bring some attention to the charity I'm supporting as I ramp up to Ironman Coeur d'Alene in June 2014.  Yes, I'm going to keep asking until I reach my goal of $2500 :)

I’m competing in 2014 as a “Blazeman Warrior.” In 2005, Jon "The Blazeman" Blais raced the big Ironman, in Hawaii, and completed it even while suffering from ALS/Lou Gehrig’s Disease. His family started the Blazeman Foundation for ALS. I’m raising money for them and in honor of Jon, I plan on rolling across the finish line in Coeur d’Alene just as Jon did when he finished. A famous quote from Jon is, "Even if I have to be rolled across the finish line, I'm finishing," so you often see Blazeman Warriors rolling across Ironman finish lines.

I also lost an Aunt to ALS so this charity is very personal to me. Any help would be appreciated.

An Ironman is 140.6 miles so even if you donated just 10 cents per mile, that would be $14.06. You can donate at the following link:

http://www.active.com/donate/teamblazeman/blazemanJJohnso

Also, a friend of mine from England has started a blog to document his big 2014 including 2 marathons, a half-Ironman, and a full Ironman.  His blog can be found here.

Yesterday, for my international friends, was Thanksgiving Day in the United States so several friends and I got together for what has become a turkey day tradition: a five mile run at Iroquois Park in Louisville. 

The run takes you up to the top of Iroquois Park, a short loop, then back down.  My best ever time at this event, and my best ever five mile run, was 41:42, which I did last year.  So I set a goal of 41 minutes or 8:12/mile and programmed my GPS watch to let me know how I was doing relative to that goal.  It tells me how far ahead or behind I am in terms of both distance and time. 

It was a 9 am start but still cold as heck, especially compared to last year.  I think the temperature at the start was right about 22 F so I bundled up in long running tights, a long sleeve tech shirt, a running jacket, a beanie and gloves.   My friend Scott, a college buddy, was running with me and we decided to stay together for the entire five miles.  It certainly made the run easier and the distance seemed to fly by. 

Since the first part of the run, probably two miles or so is uphill, getting worse as you approach the two mile mark, I was expecting to be behind a bit and then make it up but it was going very well.  The first mile was 8:12, exactly on pace, while the second was 8:15.  Again, wasn't worried, as I knew I was going to be coming back down the hill on the way back.  The third mile is relatively flat, and that was 8:09, making up for the 8:15.  Now all I had to do was hold an 8:12 or better pace on the way back down.  Mile four was 7:42, while the last one was 7:37.

Total time was 40:01, which is the most frustrating part.  Since I just had my pacer screen up, I didn't know I was that close to breaking 40 and would certainly have pushed a bit at the end to go sub-40 if I knew I was so close.  But I guess that's why we do it, right? There's always a new limit, a new goal, and now I know my goal for the 2014 version!