Doing the D.O! (-athlon,that is!)

So yesterday was the big team event I so excitedly signed Greyt and I up for. I learned one very important lesson at yesterday's race. Never, EVER, under any circumstance, sign yourself up for a race based on the post-race food. You will only be disappointed. It was Pancheros, yes, as advertised. And I do love Pancheros. BUT what I do not love is a pre-made beef Pancheros burrito served out of a large igloo cooler. Trust me, folks, it's not good.

Ok, on to the actual race report. It was a fairly chilly morning, but it started out looking like the clouds would burn off and we'd have some sunshine. However, as we spent time getting warmed up and race time grew closer, the clouds never cleared and the wind began to pick up. The park we were in was really wooded, so you couldn't really feel the full impact of the wind, but you could see the tops of the humongous trees really whipping around. So bad, in fact, that you had to dodge falling walnuts. You would just be standing there talking to someone and you'd hear a loud THUD right next to you and a walnut would roll across the ground. Fun stuff. Right before transition closed it felt like it had gotten a little chillier so I made the decision to put on my arm warmers, just in case. I don't like to be cold.

We listened to some pre-race announcements, directions on how to enter/exit transition, then the RD sang the national anthem. Yes, you heard me, the RD actually sang the anthem. He wasn't half bad either. Anyway, all 100 or so participants (minus a few team members like Greyt staying behind to bike) line up at the start line, 5-4-3-2-1. BOOM! This wasn't just a starting gun, it was a freaking mini canon. Scared the crap out of me and I even knew it was coming. It must have also jump started my adrenaline because I took off running like I stole something. At the time I was running with my friend Sarah, and she says to me "so what kind of pace are you wanting to run?" Thinking she was the one pushing the pace and I was just hanging on for dear life, I told her I didn't really have a goal but for her to go ahead and run her race so she could take her age group. Next thing I know, I'm pulling away from her and running strong.

5K #1
Mile 1 - 7:22 - OUCH that was a touch fast, but not really outside of my abilities either, IF I was only running one 5K. But I was running TWO of them in this race, so I needed to make sure I didn't kill my legs for that second one. But I also wanted to push myself and see what I could do, SO I slowed down just a bit to try and conserve a little energy.
Mile 2 - 7:42 - Ok that was a little better. I felt pretty good coming in on the first loop, hearing Greyt, Sinclair and Matt, and Laura giving me some encouragement. They helped push me along, which was awesome. With the two loop course, you could get a good look at the people both ahead and behind you on the run course, which was kind of fun. You could tell who you were gaining ground on or who was gaining ground on you. It would have been a really great set-up if I had been doing this as an individual, but as a team it didn't really tell me much, just that I seemed to be in the top 1/3 of the runners so far.
Mile 3.1 - 8:09 - So I probably picked it up a little bit coming into transition, but I knew I was going to get a little rest while Greyt was out on the bike so I pushed it in. Came into transition, put the chip on Greyt's ankle and she was off. We had her bike stashed on the rack literally 4 feet from the bike in/out, so it worked perfectly. She headed out and I attempted to catch my breath.
Intermission - OK so it wasn't intermission for Greyt (you can read about her bike experience on her blog), but it was for me. I grabbed my water bottle and my gel, then walked with Laura out to the bike course (about 1/4 or so walk) to catch Greyt coming by for her second loop of the course. By this time, the wind had picked up, the clouds had increased, and it was starting to mist a bit. It was getting downright cold. I had a coat on and was stretching and trying to stay loose. It was during this wait that I decided I needed to go out a little easier on my first mile of the next leg and try to negative split the run. This was something I wanted to work on and this was as good of a time as any. We saw Greyt come by about 20 mins later then headed back to transition to wait for her to come in. Back in transition I decided to put a long sleeved shirt on under my short sleeved one for the second run. I was considerably colder than before the race and thought the extra warmth on my core would be good.
5K #2
Greyt comes running up to transition, racks her bike as I take the chip from her and take off on the last part of the race. Remembering my goal of going out a tad easier and negative splitting the run, I consciously reminded myself to just take it somewhat easy on the first mile.
Mile 1 - 8:29 - Turned out I didn't really need to consciously remind myself to do that because my lovely IT band did it for me. Loud and clear. Within the first quarter mile I felt that all to familiar stabbing pain on the side of my right knee. Not good. All I could think about was how long it took me to recover from this last year and how I had IronGirl next weekend and the half marathon in a month...I really couldn't afford to have this take me out of commission again. So I tried to just keep my legs as loose as possible, not push anything, and just ride it out. The pain did start to lessen the more I warmed up, so not all hope was lost on my goal of negative splitting this run.
Mile 2 - 7:59 - I managed to pick up the pace a little bit on mile 2, keeping pace with a girl who had passed me about half a mile in. I couldn't quite hang with her, but I kept her fairly close throughout mile 2 and into the last mile.
Mile 3.1 - 7:29 - Yeah so I don't quite know what happened here. I guess I found my second wind. I know I was trying to gain ground on a couple of people in front of me, but I didn't realize I had picked it up that much. I came around the cones to the finish line and just tried to finish hard.

After I finished I immediately started trying to stretch my IT band. I could feel it tightening up once I stopped moving. I headed right over to the osteopathic table and signed up for a treatment. I needed some good stretching and I needed it soon. I got some water, a banana and then about 10 mins later went for the aforementioned burrito. Blech. Luckily they called my name for the treatment and I headed in to the shelter to get stretched, massaged and flexed by a 2nd year med student. About 20 mins later they announced the awards and much to Greyt and my surprise, we ended up 3rd out of 6 teams. Not to shabby considering the #1 and #2 teams were totally stacked with super fast guys. I'd say we had a pretty good day!

Monday update - The IT band is still sore, but noticeably better. High hopes for IronGirl on Sunday!