Len Paddock Invitational

Well, it wasn't the most ideal scenario, but Nick did exactly what he said he would. He has been battling a bit of a head cold for the last two days, but since he's such a great host he didn't shy away from setting the pace tonight. I'm not sure exactly what the wind was tonight but I definitely felt like it was a factor in the race. Nick took me out and led through 1200 meters. Our splits were 28 at 200, 58 at 400, 1:58 at 800, 2:29 at 1000, and 2:59 or 3 minutes at 1200. The headwind was on the back stretch so after Nick stepped off I battled the wind on my own for over 100 meters and then felt exhausted as I came into the homestretch all by myself. Afterwards I felt like I had given an incredible effort and it's just a good indicator to me that I have a lot of training to do to get where I want to head this season. After the training that I've missed so far in 2006, I'm not surprised and not discouraged because I haven't done many specific preparation workouts and things have been very inconsistent since USATF cross country in February. I definitely owe a big thanks to Mark Misch for helping to facillitate the trip, and to Nick Willis, Todd Iacovelli, and Jason Stewart for letting me crash at their place for a few days. Their hospitality has been fantastic. In all honesty, the highlight of the trip so far was seeing my high school math teacher and 7th grade basketball coach, John Huenemann. He and his wife drove down from Midland, Michigan to watch me run and took me out for a burrito at a nearby restaraunt. It was great to see them, even though our time together was very brief and it only seemed like a few minutes even though they took the time to hang out here in Ann Arbor with me for dinner and a walk. Here's a link to results: http://www.mgoblue.com/document_display.cfm?document_id=21446