Henry Wienhard's St. Patrick's Day Dash
2006-03-12
Seattle, Washington
United States
45F / 7C
Sunny

Run
Total Time = 30m
Overall Rank = /
Age Group = 40-44
Age Group Rank = 0/

Pre-race routine:

Had breakfast and headed out to Seattle. Parked and headed over to the race start. Danced a few Irish jigs to warm up and ogled at the goofs dressed up like freaks. Fun!

Event warmup:

Irish dance music and lots of silliness.

Run

Comments:

This is a fun race and one I look forward to each year. Everyone is in green, but many take it much further. We saw green people, green dogs, lots of men in kilts, lots of green hair, priests chasing a can of Guinness, Irish Dancers, Irish Setters, and Irish Beer. Starting out is difficult because there are 10,000 runners in all. We were in the first wave, but we started towards the back since we're slower than the elites (obviously). Next year I want to start up a little further.

Finally about half a mile in I was able to make some breaks. There were some fast little kids out on the course. It's so great to see them out there running with their parents. I try to avoid being behind them, though. They tend to stop when they get tired...not slow down, but just screech to a halt. Roy paced with me well the entire time. I lost him a few times, but then he'd be right up next to me. At one point I thought I'd left him behind, I heard a cough, looked back but didn't see him. Looked ahead and there he was, in front of me! Well we simply canNOT have that! I ran up next to him and paced right behind him for awhile then said "Thought you could beat me, huh?" He turned startled and said "DAMN!"

I passed him and ran it in. He came in about 40 seconds behind me, so gone is the excuse that he can't run as fast I can!

What would you do differently?:

I'd wait for Roy at the finish line and not go get water. I lost him for 50 minutes...yes, 50. I guess with 10,000 people all wearing green and grey (the shirt color), it's probably a good idea to make plans to meet...huh?

Post race

Warm down:

Wandered around and around trying to find a needle named Roy in a haystack. After we finally found each other we walked back into downtown Seattle and had coffee, then walked in and had copious amounts of sushi for lunch.

What limited your ability to perform faster:

Starting further back than we should have, but oh well!