A Few Final TC "Loony Challenge" Thoughts

Alright, it's been 2.5 weeks. Here are my 6 closing thoughts on things related to the "Loony Challenge."

• I was thrilled to finish UNINJURED!! Two days after the 10 Mile, hip felt BETTER than it did during the final 2 weeks of building miles leading up to the race! The 20 minute massage after the 10K and 5K really seemed to help. (But I've only ran twice since then - an easy run 4 days after the 10 Mile, and then the Superhero Dash 5K with Henry the next weekend. Now I haven't ran in 11 days because my hip/sacrum has been achy again, so I'm taking it easy. I'll do an easy run shortly.)

• The only thing that hurt on my body was my calves. Monday after the races, I got out of bed and my calves screamed at me. They weren't injured, just tired. Tuesday they were better. Wednesday they were about back to normal.

• My finishing percentage looks pretty great in all 3 races. When I log my races on BeginnerTriathlete, they show overall percentage. My age-grade results are all decent too, putting me at the bottom of "Regional Class" in every category:

- 10K: 0.76% (70% age graded)
- 5K: 0.78% (70% age graded)
- 10 Mile: 1.14% (72% age graded)

• Just for the hell of it, I overlaid splits from all 4 times I did the TC 10 Mile. 2009 was my first ever 10 mile, 2010 was when I was coached with the goal of finishing sub-60 (finished in 59:05), 2011 was just a normal race, and this year was the end of the Loony Challenge:

2011 and 2014 were quite similar, with just some of the earlier miles being a bit slower this year as I was pretty timid about my legs being too tired from the 2 races the day before. But I honestly could have (and should have) raced those miles a bit faster. And that graph shows that (at least for me) miles 6 and 7 are brutal. It could be the hills, or it could be mental - feeling dead but knowing there are still a few miles left.

• "Race Buddy" James found me! I got an email last week from the guy who I ran with for the middle 5 miles of the 10 Mile. Remember all the photos like this from my 10 Mile race report with James and I side-by-side?

James and I at mile 5 (seen in my race report).

He sent me an email, and then he shared his race report with me - he's got a group of running buddies who all share race thoughts via email after their races. He finished 3-4 minutes faster than he had hoped, which he was thrilled about. Here's a middle paragraph from his write-up about running with me:

... Once it leveled out I caught up to a guy in a bright plaid long-legged speedo. I noticed that he was wearing a “Loony” tag (meaning he ran the 5K and 10K on Saturday as well) so I struck up a conversation. Turns out he is a semi-famous local blogger (named, of course, “Steve in a Speedo”) who writes about running and triathlons; every group of spectators had at least one person yell out, “Go Steve!” or “Nice shorts!”. Very nice guy and we stuck together until he dropped me around mile 8.

James had made a comment or 2 during the race about all the people who knew me and all the people cheering for the shorts. At the time, I couldn't tell if he was annoyed or if he was enjoying it. Glad to hear he was OK with it! Nice running with you, James!

(And thanks to Sarah for those great photos of us at mile 5, and thanks to Shinianen for the photos around mile 8. Check out Shinianen's spectator report which includes a photo of me, and a Cookie Monster holding a sign saying "C is for Chafing." Fantastic.)

• Twin Cities in Motion "officially" congratulated Don and I on Facebook last week. Here's a screenshot of their post from Facebook:

And here's that full photo they shared of Don and I finishing the TC 10K:

Both running easy (compared to the guy in front of Don and the guy flying behind me).

Remember, I ran the 10K with my camera, and here's a photo from my 10K race report that was taken just 15 seconds before the photo above:

Don in front of me, and the guy in blue up there too. (From my 10K/5K race reports.)

In the next week or so, I'd like to write up my thoughts on how to WIN a series like this. I've only done it once, but I have 2 cents I'd like to share.

In the meantime, here are a 3 related links in case you missed them:
     - My TC 10K and 5K race reports from our first day of the "Loony" races.
     - My TC 10 Mile race report from the next day.
     - The final "Loony Challenge" standings.