So I show up at the airport at 7:30AM and it's already 75F and humid, with dewpoint of 69. On my warmup, I met couple of people from my club, who asked why I'm running, I should just walk. It was very hot when the sun would come out, and the race turned into another sweat bath. Interestingly, I saw several Kenyans and 2 Ethiopian women jogging in full warmup suits (the ladies had suits of Ethiopian national team), long pants and long sleeve jackets. That was quite amazing to see in such conditions. Anyway, at that point it was clear to me that I will not break 22 min. today and I decided not to kill myself, run an easier first mile and focus on getting the most points for this race in the Grand Prix circuit. I ran pretty relaxed, and there was minor congestion in the first 0.3 mi. with one runner going down right in fron of me, so I had to do an evasive maneuver in order to not fall myself. I hit first mile in 7:20 and I felt good. I kept the same pace on the second mile, which included 180 turn on the runway, and hit it in 7:09. I felt myself getting a little tighter and slowing down somewhat in the third mile, but I felt much better than in the last week's race and generally I was running strong. It was very hot under the blazing sun, and I kept catching up to and passing people, which was encouraging to me, that meant that others were slowing down and suffering at least no less than I was! No one passed me in the last 2 miles, and I must have passed about 10 people. I kicked in the last 0.2 mi and tried to pass one more guy, but he heard my breathing (it was loud :)) and sped up away from me. I ended up finishing in 22:38, the worst time of the year. Apparently, I slowed down more than I thought, but given the conditions, I think it's okay. Afterwards, I couldn't stop sweating for a good 40 min, it was incredibly humid. I made a mistake of getting back my bag right after I finished, because I needed a towel, but then I couldn't check it back in, or leave it unattended, so I couldn't run my cool down. I also couldn't put it back in my car, because due to very tight security (they required 2 forms of ID, one with picture, to enter the grounds), once you leave the race, you can't come back. | 