Cordwood Pete and Tamarak the Donkey
I know that this was not originally on my 2011 race schedule but I entered the prestigious 5K race held annually in Fosston, MN. Now I had not prepared for this race per say, especially this being a 5K but I thought it would be fun to through my name in the hat and see what I could do.
To the best of my memory the fastest 5K time I had ever run was 17mins 48sec, this was back in high school cross country, so I was a big interested to see what I could do. It was a bit hot out but other than that it was pretty nice weather for running. Now when I was younger growing up in Fosston, I was one of the few distance runners in the town. With the exception of my Dad and his friend Roger there were not too many other runners our putting the miles on around town. Being a big farming community most families got plenty of exercise simply taking take of the family farm. Now a days, it's a bit of a different story, when I have been back home for a weekend and manage to get in a few miles I will often see other runners out and a lot of walkers as well.
To give you an idea of the size of Fosston, I remember during cross country season that I'd do the same loop around town for my workout. Starting from my house in town and looping a half a mile outside the city limits and back around the city limits of the town and back to my house. This was a total of 4.5 miles, so this 5K (3.1 miles) would be a nice little tour of Fosston and hopefully under 17 minutes.
With about 40 total walkers and runners it was not a big race, but you never know how the competition will stack up. My goal for this race is to break the 17 minute mark. We lined up and the starters said go and we were off, I blasted off the lined right away and took the lead. As I cruised through my old neighborhood and wound around the town the first mile I was running a in the low 5 minute per mile pace, 5:18 for the first mile. Heading around the north part of town now I notice that there has been some changes since I have lived there but no time to stop and enjoy the scenery, mile number two slightly slower 5:47. Turning back west around the football field and on to the last mile I'd head just off of the main part of town and back to the start/finish line. By this time I was starting to feel my legs, they haven't seen 5 minute pace in a while.
Now coming around and the last half mile of the course, the legs were burning but I knew there was only a few meters left so I pushed on and finished. Crossing the finish line I may have surprised some people because there was no one there until I was right at the line. I clocked in at a new PR 16:51, now I will have to let you know that the course was a tenth of a mile short so I probably would have been in the low 17 minutes, but how is really counting right?
I managed to also get my first win of the year. All and all I had a fun time, I got see friends and family and added a win to my career totals.
