Near disaster

I recall setting my alarm clock for 5am last night...woke up at 5:45 this morning, and noticed I hadn't actually set the clock to go off...oops!   I had set my clothes out and packed my bag of stuff the night before and had looked at the map to get to the start and figured it would take me about 30 min to drive to the start.  I knew at the very worst, I could be a little late and work in a warm up into the first lap and then do a bit extra at the end.  I was out the door at 6am.  Amazingly I didn't forget anything.

Did a super easy warm up with the North group and then got started on the MGP part.  I knew that I would have to be conservative on the first lap and then pick it up on laps 2 and 3.  I did exactly that.  My garmin had it's yearly malfunction so I don't have any mile splits but I had the overall distance and time and averaged 7:43.  I need to run 7:38 for a 3:20 so a hair slow.  Am I disappointed?  Hell no...I'm really happy.  This time last year I attempted an easier MGP run (the Great Northern run from hell) and made it 6 miles before I completely blew up (this after Scott McIntyre was sure I could run 3:20 at Boston 08).  Took me several weeks of easy running to recover from that mistake.  Last week on a regular long run I average 8:59...my legs were dead and I just had no go at all.

I have revamped my diet and I think I can feel a difference...on less food!  I feel more alive now than I have in weeks after a long run...granted I only ran 19 miles today.  But for me that's the smart thing to do.

Enjoyed breakfast with the South group - I love your comraderie - I'm jealous in fact...doesn't seem quite there in the North group.