This race report will be short and sweet.

Thanksgiving was 5 short days after my Wild Hare 25k race, so I didn't register for this turkey trot until the day before. The Race Director said that he went from 25 registered runners to over 150 in the week before the event, thus the late registrants didn't get a t-shirt. He said he would mail it to me, which is a nice gesture and uncommon for most races (if they run out of shirts, that's too bad). So far, no t-shirt has arrived for me in the mail, though.

** Update 1/22/2015 ** My longsleeve t-shirt and finisher medal arrived in the mail the other day! Way to go Race Director!



Lake Plufgerville is a really nice venue for a race. The crushed granite trail winds its way around the shore of the lake. The trail surface was nice and flat (unlike some lake trails which have continuous camber / slope down towards the water). Race morning was a bit chilly and breezy, but the sun was shining and overall it was a beautiful morning. It was great that I didn't have to fight Austin traffic in order to run a Turkey Trot.

At the start I went out under control, 3 or 4 of us out near the front. When we crossed the spillway over the dam within the first half mile, one runner made a quick move. I had to decide whether to let him go or go with him. I decided to go with him. It was quite windy that morning so when we turned the corner into the wind I tried to draft behind him. Before making in halfway around the lake I got close enough to hear his breathing which was much harder than mine at the time. When I felt him slow down I pushed on past. Running around the lake there is good visibility to the people ahead and behind. At the sharp turns I looked back to see if anyone else was nearby and it didn't look like it. I was winning the race!

I pressed on, finished the second lap around the lake, and came through the finish line in 36:28, which seemed really fast, and would have been a nice big 10k PR... if the course had been accurate.

My only complaint about the event is that the course was short. Using Google Maps Pedometer, I determined that one lap around the lake was a tiny bit under 3 miles, not the 3.1 needed for a 5k. The actual course was a bit longer than two laps (a little extra at the beginning, a little extra at the end), but it did not make up for the missing distance.

I received an email after the race that next year they plan to make the course measurement accurate. So, that would be a good improvement. I suggested that they don't even need to make the distances longer they just need to call the races what they are... a 3 miler and a 6 miler... which is totally fine for a turkey trot type of event.

Despite the course measurement issue, it feels nice to win a race every once in a while.

The trophies were real wood and quite nice:



Lake Pflugerville made a nice backdrop for eating my post-race double pie (pecan and pumpkin) with whipped cream, hot coffee in my hand:



As I said, this race report was going to be short and sweet... SHORT due to the short course measurement and SWEET due to the double post-race pie. :)