When I arrived at the flagpole on the Moorhead campus, Chief Manuel was there and hardly anyone else. Turns out we had to wait for the handful of faculty who showed up one by one. Late. But better never than late, right? Stephen Brunson was the only student who had the nerve to take on us old folks. God bless him.
Finally, our driver bused us out Macon Lake Road and unceremoniously dumped us on the tarmac and then drove himself back to town. Out there with us were Chief and a couple of other Campus Police, one in a squad car and another in one of those bad boy buggy things or whatever they are called.
I faced two runners and the rest, four or five more, were walkers. It was hot, 91 degrees, which made my determination to pace myself better than yesterday even more important. This time I had no one sprinting out in front of me. Only one other runner, Amy the science teacher, stayed with me for 100 meters or so. But still I started faster than planned. I went past the first mile marker in 8:14 as apposed to 8:08 the day before. Believe it or not, those six seconds made a difference. The two race paces went like this:
Mile one- 8:08/8:14
Mile two- 8:25/8:21
Mile three- 8:46/8:18
As you can clearly see those six seconds did make a difference. This was not a negative split, but way closer and certainly not the collapse I feared. My intention was to go out in 8:20, another six seconds slower than I did. I think that would have been perfect.
Well, I won and it was fun. Now it's time to shift back to The Great Noxapater Journey Run Training. By the way, I have reservations at Seldom Seen, the Carroll County slice of heaven situated just outside the metropolis of Carrollton and owned by a friend of mine. Thank you Wilson Carroll. This shortens my first day a bit and takes some pressure off me. I plan to leave on a Thursday after school. I may shuffle into Seldom Seen after dark, but that is OK. I'm getting excited.
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