Yesterday afternoon I ran a charity run in the neighboring town of Weingarten with friends from my running club to help raise money for Leukemia research. We planned on running ten 1.3 km loops, but ended up running 13 loops - it was a fun run for a good cause.
Later my running buddy (RB) called and asked if she could ride with me the next day to the Philippsburger Festungslauf (Fortress Run) in Philippsburg, about 20 minutes from our town. I asked her which race she was running, but she wasn't sure if she was going to run the 10K or the half-marathon, it would depend on the weather. I casually said I would run with her in either case and told her I would see her in the morning.
This morning it was raining out when I woke up, but the sky cleared and the sun was shining as I pulled up in front of RB's house. As we made our way to Philippsburg, I asked RB what she wanted to run and she said if it didn't matter to me then the half-marathon. I thought about my ongoing recovery from my 100 km race a week ago and my upcoming 50-mile race next Saturday for maybe a mega-second and said okay, let's do it.
We met some other members of our running club in front of the school where the race was to start. Two other women, Andrea and Birgit were running the half-marathon and eight were running the 10K race. We collected our start number and chatted with our friends until shortly before the start. After stopping by the car to drop off what we didn't need we lined up in the back of the pack at the start. RB wanted to run at an easy pace, so we could finish in around two hours and 15 minutes.
After a few minutes the starting signal went off and we slowly made our way forward with the other 400 +/- runners. I let RB pick the pace and we settled down for an enjoyable run. This was the first time I ran in Philippsburg, so I was looking forward to seeing something different.
Shortly before the first kilometer we caught up to Andrea, was wanted to break 2-hours with the half-marathon distance. The fact that we caught up to her was enough for me to see she was running too slow to meet her goal. RB and I kept up our slightly faster pace and Andrea stayed with us. After awhile I slowly picked up the pace a little, checking occasionally with RB if the pace was okay for her. Eventually we reached a pace that would bring Andrea to the finish line to meet her goal, the question remained if she could hold it.
The kilometers clicked away, we passed the 10K point in almost exactly an hour, I knew we would be hard pressed to finish under two hours. I again slowly increased the pace, but I could tell Andrea was pushing her limit. RB was still holding strong, but after a couple kilometers our pace drifted down again. I decided the best would be to try to hold steady and come what may. With about 15 minutes to go we left the woods where we had been running and headed over a bike path back to Philippsburg. There was almost no shade and it was getting quite hot outside, Andrea struggled to hang with us.
We kept encouraging her and gradually she picked up the pace a little as we headed back towards the school. I let the ladies in front of me as we finished on after another in 2:06:55-57. Andrea was had given it her best, you could tell she was pretty wiped out. RB was still looking strong to her credit. My legs were a little tired, but otherwise I was relaxed and felt great.
Andrea decided to go home, her couch was calling her. RB and I joined some of the others for some cake and coffee in the school. We hung around for the awards ceremony and had a good time chatting with friends. For me it was a good training run and a good time with friends that I really appreciate.
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