It’s been a long time since I used the words, “Mike, Start your Engine,” but I felt that way this morning. It’s usually some other race I’m watching – like the Indy 500. I was burning my own rubber on what I thought was a routine 5k race that turned out to be much longer. It was my first race as a seventy year old, hoping that this new age classification would mean high placement. However, it appeared that there were a lot more people that aged more gracefully when it comes to speed. I’m not sure yet if the distance confusion helped my case, since so many runners surpassed the turnaround point by mistake. There were no officials to guide us, but my GPS read-out was  indicating that we had already gone too far. 

My first mile was at 12’15” – the best I’ve had since moving to Florida. It was probably the adrenaline of running with a pack of people and the cool temperatures. The other two additional miles were slightly slower but overall my pace was about 12’30,” when normally it’s closer to 13’45.” My total distance covered was 3.5 miles instead a standard 5k of 3.1. When I crossed the finish line, 43 minutes had passed, including the minutes it took to the starting line where my chip started to officially measure my time.  Normally, there’s an e-mail to immediately follow-up with race results, but I’ve yet to see anything from race organizers and even the website is not updated.  The awards ceremony was probably an angry mob scene after we left. 

I’ve participated in other races where the course was not properly marked, so this was not a first. I didn’t expect to be competitive and simple relied on my Nike Run Club app for splits and mile markers. Unfortunately, I had just uploaded the app yesterday after all my past data mysteriously disappeared in an overnight software update, so I wasn’t confident that it was working properly. It wasn’t until I heard the other runners complaining that I knew for sure that my numbers were correct and the course was wrong. The extra mileage was not a big deal to me, so I claimed my finishing medal and a quick breakfast prior to leaving. Some runners were still on the course as we pulled out of the parking lot. 

The route took me by the seven practice fields outside the stadium, and I caught a glimpse of the batting cages and work out areas associated with the Atlanta Spring Training facility. The finish line was near home plate and we circled the dirt warning track along the outfield fences to get there. I’m glad I made the effort to participate and may even do it again next year. I’ll report my overall and age group finishing positions once that information is available. Unfortunately, it won’t be completely accurate since some runners went as much as a mile out of their way, while others took short cuts. It was much more eventful than a boring 5k run through the neighborhood that will happen again tomorrow morning – consecutive day number 4,725! As they say in the South, “Happy Race Day Y’all!”