I've done this five-miler several times. This year it's a little special, as the church was able to wrestle its own name away from Hermes Cleveland, the company that was "managing" the race for them. "Managing" is in quotes because the church received a relatively tiny amount of donation from the event. When they fired Hermes, Hermes tried to sue the church, alleging that the company, not the church, owned the name, St. Malachi Run. There was a predictably massive backlash against Hermes, and they dropped the lawsuit. But would a lot of runners show up for today's run? Would they support the church?
You bet. There was a huge number of runners out there on this cold but clear morning. It was heartwarming.
It was also good to see so many of my friends out there. It seemed like there were very few who actually were not running today. I warmed up with a few of them.
Eight-minute pace is pretty good, isn't it? I know. This used to be my training, not my racing pace. I remember when a six-minute pace was the goal for this sort of thing. But even though I do some speedwork at eight, I didn't know whether I could maintain it for the whole five miles.
Turns out that I could. Barely. I finished in something like 39:26. I think I was slowing a little towards the end. I was fourth in my ancient, soon to be ancienter age-group.
Last year I did some 5Ks at an eight-minute pace. But then I also ran a half-marathon at that pace as well. I still have a ways to go before they can declare me the greatest runner who ever lived.
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