Welcome to the Big Time

As I crossed the 5,000 meter mark of our 6,000 meter race, I heard a man announcing the time of the first finisher. My initial thought was, "Wow! That is soooo not fair." Then I had to chuckle to myself (as much as you can chuckle after 5,000 meters). The girls crossing the finish line had blown my pace out of the water, they had pushed harder than me to get there first, it was perfectly fair, and reasonable for that matter, that they finish before me.
We were in the 21st chute on a starting line longer than I had ever seen before (to give you an idea, the 21st chute put us about in the middle). It only took a matter of seconds after the gun went off for me to get lost in a sea of 223 runners all headed for the same narrowing curve up ahead.
The good news is that I didn't take out too fast with the pack this time. I knew there was a reason I was running for Baker University and not Nebraska or K-State. The bad news was that I started out way too slow. I remember hearing a coach yelling to his runner that she was in 119th place; I was just a few behind her. I worked my way up the pack the entire race. I crossed the finish line behind only 86 of the 223 competitors, with a time that landed me the 13th fastest 6K time for BU. I was satisfied.
The rest of the team did well, too. Our pack time remains close, which is a good thing (pack time is the amount of time difference between the first BU runner and the last BU runner to cross the finish line).
It was a rather chilly morning, which helped keep our heart rates down and our minds off the longer race. This week's practices are supposed to be plenty easy in order for us to have fresh legs for the meet at Marion Lake this weekend, hosted by Tabor.