Sunday March 30th,Hamilton
It was a brisk, windy morning of race day in the Hammer as my dog and I shivered on our early morning walk and conditions check before deciding on race wear for my 3rd Around The Bay race.
This would be my first actual “race” here,the other 2 priors being a Boston tune-up in “07 and an injury plagued run in ’05.Training had gone well for the most part and I knew that my previous best time of 2:09 was sure to be beaten.
The plan was simple…run back to back to back to back to back to back sub 20 minute 5k’s.Simple.
All was going well until 8k or so when my old abductor tendon decided that it just didn’t like the cool,windy conditions and started to spasm.With much disappointment I had to allow the 2hr pace bunny to pull away,along withwent my training buddy Dave who wanted to use me as a pacer!Finally just past 15k the spasm’s subsided and I got back on track.The hilly section between 17 and 22 k passed with no recurrence of the abductor spasm’s and it wasn’t long before the hill at 26k was in sight.As I approached the preceeding downhill I saw in the distance a familiar sight,a Team Running Free long sleeve shirt.This was all the motivation I needed to pick up the pace.A chance to say hey and bring it home strong with a new team-mate.As I approached the runner I recognized him as Oswin Hall one of the better trail runners in S.Ontario so I was pretty stoked to be in this sort of company.I hadn’t looked at my watch in quite a while but I knew now that I had a decent time going.
We took the hill and began the gradual descent down to Copps and the finish line.Much to my surprise I pulled away from my team-mate and legged it with all I had left and was ecstatic with a close but no cigar 2:00:35 finishing time.
Can’t wait for next year’s race as I finally have the confidence to Go 4 Gold.
Cheers
Anthony Davey
