aka “Racing by the Numbers”. Yeesh. As I look back at the Cougar Mtn Series 5 miler, all I can muster up is “well, in hindsight that’s pretty much EXACTLY what I should have expected.” Although I had no proof, I had no reason to not think that I was a bit slower than last year. The past few months I’ve been focusing more on going longer, and my speed work has been scaled back in terms of intensity while increasing in duration. After all, the important race this season in the big ol’ 50 miler in late July, not the quick 5 miler in mid May. The thing was, I didn’t know how much slower I was. And with there being no mile markers on this course outside of Scott McCoubrey under-selling how much further you have to go when you see him around mile 3, I wouldn’t know how much slower I was until I crossed the finish line.

At the starting line, I stood with Chris Bender as we scanned for The Swede. Chris had never met him and I described him as “…uhh…he looks Swedish…and he’s got a big bushel of hair.” We ran into his friend Debbie and I inquired about Martin’s whereabouts. We were told solemnly that he actually hadn’t arrived to the states yet, his flight grounded by the volcanic debacle in Iceland. “Well THAT fucking sucks,” I thought to myself, selfishly, as usual. Chris and I slowly made our way near the front of the start. While McCoubrey described the course, I realized I’d been standing around for a good 5-7 minutes and decided to get in a stride or two at the last second, and on my way to an open patch of land, there was the Swede. “Does Debbie know you’re here? She told us your flight never made it.” “Debbie gave me a ride today!” I’d been had, as usual.

About 20 seconds after my one and only stride, the race began with the same loop as the year before. Martin and I were around 5th or so getting onto the fire road, and quickly Martin took the lead, a younger, late-high school/early-college looking student dutifully following him, myself in 3rd. About a week ago, Martin had let me know that the ski season in Sweden had only just ended and, his hometown still covered in snow, he’d only gotten in about a week’s worth of actual running. Ya know, with shoes and everything, only one of which was a “speed” workout. Nevertheless, he looked good today.

We got onto the single track and, like last year’s 7.5 miler, he and his follower started slowly pulling away from me. We started climbing the first hill and I quickly realized hill climbing is not one of my strengths at the moment. Which, as I thought about it between agonizing breaths, made sense since I hadn’t been doing the kind of short & hard hill charges I’d been doing last year. I was passed about halfway up the hill by a guy in one of those repugnant Club NW jerseys. As he got smaller I seemed to forget my long term racing goals and regretted NOT training for fast 5 mile races.

I reached the lone water station, around mile 3, still in 4th and not hearing anybody behind me. McCoubrey was there with his impeccably-behaved 5(?) year old kid, who stood cheerfully and silently, holding out a cup of water. Weird to say, he lightened my mood a bit, as I declined the water as politely as I could muster (not very). McCoubrey announced “a little up, then the rest is flat or down, about 2 miles!” I’ve learned from past experiences at these races to always add about a half mile to whatever distance Scott announces is left, and I finished the final climb, secretly listening behind me for Scott’s voice encouraging whoever was in 5th. I didn’t hear anything.

After cresting the 2nd climb I finally started to feel good. Sure it was on the gradual downhill of the final 2 miles, but I really felt like I was hitting it good and quickly lost all worry of losing 4th. The final brief up & down of the last half mile was soon upon me and I crossed in 33:41, not at all surprisingly, 10 seconds slower than last year.

I immediately asked the timekeeper who won. He pointed towards the food tent. “That goofy looking guy in the red shorts,” he announced, obviously referring to The Swede. He might not have said “goofy”, I forget. I asked the margin of victory. “Umm, pretty good. About 40 seconds?” he replied. His final time was 32:00, 10 seconds faster than last year’s winner.

We were both wearing our Polar watches, and we found out my avg HR was 181 with a max of 189, while his was 180/186. Last year I hit only 179/184. I…don’t know what any of that means, but I’m guessing it boils down to Martin being in better shape than I. Some things never change.

Me

Him