Tailgate Challenge

After the Detroit Marathon, I took some a little vacation.  The vacation was mostly from my diet.  I cut myself loose for about two weeks, and today's my first day starting to wrangle things back into control.  Surprisingly, I didn't take any time off from running.  That I was back at Tuesday, just two days after the 26.2.

Now when I say I cut myself loose, I don't mean any cute "oopsie, I had a carb" business.  I've pretty much been subsisting on corn dogs, buttermilk waffles, pizza rolls, every high calorie coffee-adjacent concoction from Tim Hortons, and any form of cherry cola I can get my hands on.  Anyway, I needed the break, and I deserve it.  However, I don't expect to continue this the entire winter like last year.

Saturday, I ran my first race since Detroit.  The Tailgate Challenge is not the biggest, best, or most organized race ever, but it's fun running around with the other racers decked out in their Michigan or Michigan State gear.  As a Spartan (Michigan State), with this race literally running through one of the University of Michigan's satellite campuses (which, in addition to MSU, is also my Alma Mater), you can expect to be completely outnumbered by Michigan Wolverines.

Like last year, they've abandoned the fanbases running against each other, clock-wise and counter clock-wise.  I wish they'd bring it back, but when you do see the rival colors ahead of you, it does make you want to catch and pass them more.  However, there wasn't a lot of that going on for me.

Not to sound like a total wuss, but 5Ks are harder than I remember.  Sure, I've ran that distance, lately, but not actually going for speed, and certainly not in the race environment, where you push just a bit more.  As far as that goes, my last 5K was in July.  I think I was about a 1/2 mile in when I started to get tired.

In the two loops of the 5K, by the end of loop one I was starting to feel pretty tired, and could feel the lactic acid starting to build up.  It felt like I was running in slow motion, and if I had to guess my time during the race, I would have guessed somewhere in the 30-32 minute range.  I couldn't close the gap and catch J, and I was shocked when the time was still well within the 20s when I finished.

I put up a conveniently rounded 27:30.  That felt good.

After, we tried to find an open bar, not realizing it was only like 10am.  Then we tried to find an open coffee shop, trying Brown Sugar and then Good Beans.  That didn't go well either.  J gave up and we decided to meet back at my house for a few beers and to watch some Premier League.  I worked my way over to Flint Crepe Company for a Butter Pecan Latte (again with the coffee calorie count), and met him back home for some Founder's Harvest Ale and some Bavarian Inn Dark (for the record, both are fantastic).

Oh, and, most importantly, Michigan State crushed Michigan so hard their team looked ready to break down and cry.