The second race in the Arizona Road Racers Summer Series took place at Reach 11 sports complex on the morning of June 12th. The course featured challenging trails with hairpin turns, uneven ground, ditches and lots of dust. Like the prior race, I decided to have a small cup of coffee before the race, I opted not to eat breakfast until afterwards and had a light dinner the evening before. The weather was nice and cool for a mid June morning in Phoenix. With the weather here, if you don’t think it’s hot, you just have to wait a minute.

Before the race, I did about a mile warm up with one of my running friends. Things began to heat up as the race began and we were off. As I started, I was a little worried that I was pushing a little too quick when I heard in front of me what must have been a coach to a cross country runner. Since school is out for most kids, there were plenty of high school athletes on this course. The coach said, “Look out for the rabbits. They will begin to drop back near the first turn. You will know who they are.” Yes, some runners take this series pretty seriously.

Sure enough, as we approached the first turn, bodies began falling back and slowing down. One race strategy that I have been recently implementing is a speed boost. The surge of speed helps me to pass runners and clear the area in front of me to make sharp turns or make a move on another runner after pacing with them. As we hit the turns, there were small ditches on the trail that required you to frequently adjust your gait.

On turn three, I heard a little motivation from behind me. A voice saying, “C’mon Paul. Let’s go” helped me for about a quarter of a mile before she turned it up and sliced through traffic. On the straightaway back to the finish line, I pushed pretty hard and noticed that I was beginning to run out of steam. Once I saw the finish line, I began to put it into overdrive.

This was another great 5k in the books and a better time than the last one. I appear to still be making improvements on my shorter distance races, which should help my mentality when attacking speed drills. I am not sure at which point I am no longer a “new” runner, but I am not sure if it is bad luck to talk about the standings. Let’s just say it is a close one in my age group. My strategy for the next race is to hunt down a couple of runners, pace them, then turn it up.

Overall, I am feeling pretty good and I have been able to remain injury free. For those of you that do not know, I had been plagued by injury for the majority of my first year of running. I have been able to remain without injury as a result of properly adjusting my weekly distance, watching my speed on easy days, stretching, warm ups and resistance training. I am looking forward to the next event. It will be a four-mile run on the Fourth of July. Until then, run safe and run strong.