8 on the 8th Report -- Greenville, SC

Short report. We traveled out of state to celebrate our son's wedding with our extended families. They got married in Cape Town, S Africa in early March and most of our family were not able to attend. So, our family and friends mostly live in the eastern half of the US, so we did one "reception" in South Carolina on Saturday. Her family is in Washington state so they fly to Seattle on Tuesday and will have the west coast reception next Saturday. Lots of fun -- got to spend some time with people who we hadn't seen for 4 years.

Anyway, all of that necessitated an adjustment of my training schedule for the half marathon in 2 weeks. I ran 12 miles on Friday morning. The hills in Greenville, SC are much worse that the ones I run in Richmond, VA. Still, it was a good run.

For the 8 on the 8th race, I opted to use the average of miles 2-12 to calculate my 8 mile time since I forgot to mark my time for miles 2-9 (my first mile of a training run is always slow so that I can warm up). With that caveat (and with the assumption that our wonderful, understanding race director will allow my calculations) and reminding myself that this race was 8 miles out of a total of 12 (thus, a bit slower than normal), here's my result: 8 miles @ 8:31 mpm = 1 hour, 8 minutes, 9.9 seconds

Nancy, the race was well organized but I must say the 5:30 AM starting time was a little early and there weren't a lot of spectators out. Having a banana and a Gu (Chocolate w/caffeine) before my start and being able to pick up 22 oz of Gatorade Freeze and a package of Shot Bloks as I walked to the starting line was wonderful. Then, my support team was in place at the end with about a quart of ice water. So, you really did outdo yourself with the organization. Thanks.

Run well, y'all,
Bob