Did a mile warm-up and felt ready for the race. I knew this course would be difficult with the many hills in it. This was the biggest turnout I've seen for this race, there were so many people. I have ran this course before two years ago and finished with a 41 or something close to that. That didn't help though cause shortly after the start we missed the first turn, (like 15 meters from the start) and kept going straight. It was some guy in blue that was leading. I was close and about 10 or so guys had to turn around. It didn't hurt much but I couldn't help laughing at the mistake which probably cost me more time. I ran with Paul and JD for the first mile. It was a lead pack of about 8 people, including Sylvan and Henry. The lead guy in blue slowly started surging and gaping the group. That's when Steve shot from the pack and caught him. I surged too and caught the two of them. Now it was just me Steve and the blue guy (I didn't get a chance to ask him his name.) Steve than dropped back on the first uphill, I thought about it too because we were starting too fast but I wanted to see if I could keep up with the lead guy. On the second hill I started fading so I let him go as well. He never really took off fast and left me in the dust, it was much more gradual and I used him to make sure I was going the right way. I came in at 11:50 for the first 2 mile. At the 3 mile mark I was at 18:12 and felt a little discouraged by the time. I was still alone but I was expecting to be caught by my teammates or Steve. At the last hill I glanced back and Henry, Steve, Daniel and some really fast girl were within reach. I started to surge, cresting the hill. After around mile four, which I was at 25:20 I glanced back and their was no one. Here I started getting small side aches and I got too comfortable with my lead so I started to kinda slowly cruise. I probably shouldn't of done that, but at the moment I wanted to save some for a kick. The last .2 I heard steps behind me and saw Steve right there so I started surging. I made it to the finish with a 38:02, not bad but could be better. The winner finished 2 minutes ahead. Steve was close behind while Henry finished with a 39:44. Sylvan and JD finished in the 40s. Overall I thought it was a good race and now the only races I have to look forward are Indoor Triathlons and worse even, Indoor track meets (running circles on a 200 Meter track bores me more than math) for the rest of the year.
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