A little over a month ago I ran the Ocala Marathon in a bit under 3:19, or 7:35 minutes per mile.

For the Five Points of Life Marathon, I was planning for even pacing of 7:10 - 7:30 per mile, hoping to earn a Boston Qualifying time (BQ) and run a personal best. I also thought that if I had an exceptional day I might finish in the top 5 to earn some prize money.

My final time was 3:12:14, or 7:20 per mile, which improves over my previous personal best marathon at Five Points last year and accomplished all of my goals (except for prize money).

A confident start:


Photo by Five Points of Life (via Facebook)

My first half ended up being a little faster than the second half but splits were pretty consistent. I resisted the urge to push the pace. A good portion of the race included the company of Rob Robins who I know through various ways. The first part of the race was relatively cool, and even as the sun rose higher and higher we had some cloud cover until about mile 15. Heat is always a potential adversary in Florida and we started seeing the carnage of the warm day after about mile 15, with quite a few people coming back to us. We saw at least three runners ahead of us stop to walk. We plowed on at the same consistent pace and kept moving up in the standings.

Somewhere near mile 20 the aid station was located just past and sort of behind the relay exchange tent. When Rob and I ran past there was one guy standing there with one cup of water. I grabbed the cup and there was no way for Rob to get a water without turning around and running back for it. We yelled some angry words. They need to fix that layout next year and maybe give just a little more training to the aid crews. Since it was really warming up by this point I shared the water with Rob. It must have helped since Rob soon started to pull away and I wasn't able to keep up.

Miles 24 onward were very hard for me due to full sun and heat. I'm pretty sure we were warmer by the finish than this year's Olympic Trials in L.A. I pushed on and didn't completely fall apart, with my last couple miles in 7:40ish pace. I took 5 or 6 energy gels total. I took water at every aid station and what I didn't drink I poured over myself for cooling.

Congrats to Rob Robins who is an endurance machine, running his first marathon in 3:10:11. Rob finished 5th and earned some award money. I finished 6th overall and took 1st Masters.

Relieved at the finish:


Photo by BB Action Photo

More pics follow...


Running on 34th Street near the painted wall:


Photo by BB Action Photo


16th Ave near 34th Street:


Photo by BB Action Photo

Running through the Duck Pond area:


Photo by Five Points of Life (via Facebook)

The Finish!


Photo by BB Action Photo

Rob Robins returns the favor and brings me a cup of water at the finish:


Photo by Cathy Bester

The Five Points of Life Marathon was run on Feb. 21, 2016 in Gainesville, Florida. Results are available:
http://results.drcsports.com/raceFile...fullag.htm



Race T-shirt and award (glass bottle) for 1st place Masters. I ran in Altra Instinct 1.5 shoes.