This was the first road race that I ran last year in Laramie so I decided to do it again. I hadn't run at all since Silent Trails so I wasn't expecting much out of myself here. When I went into registration, I saw Jesse Gray signing up for the 5k. I decided to take the easy route and run the 10k so I wouldn't have to race anybody fast. I go out to the car and dink around trying to waste time until the start. I wasn't going to warm up much because 10k is a long way when you haven't run in awhile. I head back into the building and none other than Chris Schabron, last weekend's Silent Trails champion, is registering for the 10k. In attempting to avoid competition, I accidently ran into better competition!
The race started out at a pretty quick pace with Chris intent on putting me out of my misery early as Nik did last year. Somehow I hung on through the race and due to Chris not knowing the course/poor markings/no guidance, I caught up around 4 miles. Chris quickly put the gap back up to where it had been and it looked to be over. However, in the last stretch, I thought that I might have a chance. The presence of 5k-ers gave me enough cover to slowly but surely eat the gap on Chris. I caught him at a 90 degree turn about 15 meters out from the finish. I came in too hot and lost my momentum around the corner and he recovered from his shock enough to out-lean me. It was probably the best photo finish I have ever had for 1st place. We were both just under Nik's course record from last year's inaugural race. I was very happy with my performance and it was a great start to training for my 2014 slate of races.
