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Slippery Misery

Huge huge day of bowl games today

Today I ran the Big Beach Half Marathon in Gulf Shores, Alabama.
I have a new race strategy inspired from Vince Young. In the 2006 Rose Bowl, where Vince Young and the Texas Longhorns upset the USC dynasty, he said his plan was, “In the first half, maintain. And then in the second half, go the fuck off.” So I think I am gonna adopt that as my race strategy from now because that seemed to work well today. Race report:

Miles 1-7: I maintained. I chatted with the lead bike for a bit (which is why my third mile is kinda slow). He’s a UP’er which was cool. I came through the half in about 38:00. Which was ok. Just meant that in the second half I needed to “go the fuck off.” The weather could not have been more perfect for some fast racing.
Miles 8-10: I picked it up and was feeling AMAZING. With 5k to go, I was planning on dropping some 5:30’s and maybe faster. The mile markers on the course were off by about 200m, which made me irrationally mad. If you’re a race director, HOW do you sleep at night with inaccurate mile markers.

Then during the 11th mile is where shit hit the fan.

So, I knew I needed to cross a bridge at some point and so did the lead bike, but when I came through 10 miles and the mile marker was nowhere in sight, we though that we had somehow got off course. So, in a split second decision, I took a turn at the next bridge, which was a HUGE mistake. We were actually still on the right course; taking this turn took me off the course.

This was a bad bridge. I had to go down a fucking flight of stairs and run on the fucking beach in the sand for a bit to get back to the road that would take me to the finish. Soooo that’s why my 11th mile is slow. Once I got back on the road and eventually back on the course, I just didn’t give a fuck anymore about the race. With that slow 11th mile, I knew a PR was out the window, and I didn’t even know what my total distance would be. So instead of really pushing it in like I was going to (I was CRUISING before – miles 9 and 10 were 5:38 and 5:36 and I was feeling amazing!), I just coasted in. And then to make things even worse, I missed the turn to the finish because THEY STILL HAD CONES UP BLOCKING IT OFF. How the fuck do you mess that up??? But then the lead bike (who actually was behind me, L) yelled to me that I was actually supposed to turn in to the finish there. ffs.

Luckily, my distance still ended up being 13.1, but FUCK with how I was feeling I was ready to drop a time in the low 14’s. Shit happens, and it was definitely my fault (I’m not gonna blame the lead bike or the race director) for taking the wrong turn. I knew to keep going straight but I didn’t. Just frustrating that my time won’t show what I was truly capable of.

Even so, I am still happy. The median age in this race was like 32 lol everyone thought I was a god when I finished. Deadass, some of the old locals were asking in 100% seriousness if I had any sponsors lmao. 1:15 isn’t actually that good…

I still had a nice negative split overall though. And some more nipple bleeding lol I just can’t escape no matter how much body glide I use.

Official time was 1:15:10, 20 seconds off a PR. I knew I was absolutely in good shape and fitness to beat my 1:14:50, but sometimes some dumbassery happens and life goes on. After the race I talked to some of the local 70 y/o geezers who told me they moved down here "to meet some fine ass women." Gotta watch out for them geezers.

I have never had more trust in The Process until now. My dumbassery on the course was not an accident. The Process continues to work in mysterious ways.

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Jacob Young

"In the first half, maintain. And then in the second half, go the fuck off."

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Slippery Misery

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