Buffalo Wallow 6k - 8th overall

I always loved running cross country in high school and college and I enjoy running the Buffalo Wallow race. It was a tough day and I wasn't quite in top racing form, but I survived the race. I had a pretty hectic race and my training wasn't the greatest the past week and I did an relatively easy 6 miles the day before. I wasn't sure I was going to run the race because my wife was feeling a little under the weather and was still in bed at 8:00 and I either had to wake her up to take care of our daughter or let her sleep. She ended up getting up at 8:10 so I decided I'd head down to the race (started at 9:00) and hopefully it wouldn't be too late to register. I got there about 8:30, registered and did an abbreviated warmup. The course had changed slightly due to the new pedestrian bridge across the bayou and it seemed like it might have been a tad longer than past years. The footing was definitely a little softer and the course was slower than past years.

At the starting line I saw Colin Carroll and Vaughn Gibbs who I knew would both probably beat me and a few other guys I didn't really know. The course is 3 laps around a ~2k loop. I probably started out too fast since I was right on the tail of the top 5 or 6 guys about 1/2 a mile into the race. During the first lap, the top 8 guys split out into 2 packs of 4 and the top 4 guys pulled ahead. I stayed with the 2nd group of four the first lap and the 1st 1/3 of the 2nd lap and then the other three guys pulled a little ahead. I stayed in fairly close contact through the 2nd lap, but I was hurting by the end of the 2nd lap and still had a lap to go. At that point, I didn't think I was going to catch any of the guys in front of me unless they completely blew up and I was just hoping to not throw up and not to have anyone else catch me. Fortunately I achieved those goals and finished in 22:34. I was about 30 seconds behind the 5th place guy and I think if I were feeling a little fresher coming in and had run a little smarter early in the race I should have been able to finish 5th.

I'm planning on running the Rodeo Run 10k next weekend and then running in the Texas Independence relay the week after that with some fellow Kenyan Way runners.