Boilermaker '07

Yesterday I ran the Utica Boilermaker, a 15k running race with over eleven-thousand people in it. This is the fourth Boilermaker I've run and I think it was my slowest time. As always it was hot and sunny during the race, and over all a great day!

Tora, Andy, and I left Boston on Saturday to go to Utica and met up with Tora's parents in Albany. We had some time to kill before they arrived so we went to the Apple store in Crosgates Mall to check out the iPhone. The iPhone is totally amazing and we all wished that we had one.

After we got to Utica and picked up our race packets at the Expo, Tora's parents Steve and Tracey wanted to go to the Saranac Brewery. Saranac is a big sponsor of the Boilermaker and the race ends right at the brewery. We had only planned to swing by the gift shop there but a nice tour lady convinced us to do a tour. I had done the tour once in high school with my Aunt Lois and Uncle Tom but I guess I wasn't paying much attention that time. I learned a whole lot about the brewery and had fun checking out the gigantic tanks of beer.

On Sunday we had to be down at the parking spot by 6:30 AM in order to get to the start on time. It takes a lot of coordination to get 11,000+ runners all to a starting line and they were running shuttle buses from various parts of the city to the start. We managed to snag a great parking spot near the finish and catch a shuttle down no problem.

At the start they break everyone up by their seed time and put them into starting pens. This way the faster people get out first and don't run over the walk/run type people. Tora and Tracey were in the last pen, I was in the second to last and Steve was one ahead of me. We all broke up a little before the start and headed to our places. Steve and I were planning on meeting up after the start and running together but there was such a crowd that this was like impossible.

The race went ok for me, but I was bummed at how out of shape I am. I purposefully took it easy for the first 3 miles because I didn't want to die on the last few. I actually felt pretty good going up the only major hill from 3 to 4 miles. During that push I looked up to see Jeff and Alyssa in front of me so I ran up and slapped Jeff's ass, which was excellent. Coming off the hill felt pretty good and it was nice to stretch my stride out and actually pretend that I was a runner in good shape.

After that downhill I basically went into survival mode and just cruised. I had one mile where I felt terrible because it was slightly uphill and blazing hot, so I ran an 8:54. That was humbling. I chased Dennis and Morgan for a bit which was kind of fun, but they got away from me before the finish. When I went through the line I actually felt pretty good. This didn't really surprise me because I hadn't been pushing it, just trying to finish

My mile splits were:

1. 8:03
2. 8:05
3. 8:05
4. 8:26
5. 7:09
6. 7:45
7. 8:54
8. 7:47
9. 8:25

My total time was 1:15:17, which is right what I thought it would be. I'll post about the post race party later when I get some time.