Just over 3 weeks ago (July 18th) I headed over to Vancouver for the Summerfast 10km, which was also the 2015 BC 10km Championships. I got up early on Friday, completed my run and visited my Chiro (Abe @ Island Optimal) for treatment. Upon leaving there it was 10:30 and I figured I had enough time to grab a smoothie, water and get gas before heading to the ferry terminal for the 12:15 ferry.
This is where I made my first mistake of the weekend. I stopped at Booster Juice for my smoothie and then went next door to Save on Foods to grab a water. For the life of me I couldn't find their fridges with cold water but finally after wandering around and around I found what I was looking for. I got in line to pay and decided another line was moving faster so I and another man buying one item both moved over to the same line.
Next thing we know, the cashier's computer froze. As we watched her try to fix it, the original line kept moving (gah always stay in the initial line). Eventually we were told to move over to a brand new line and another cashier would ring us in, so over we moved. Then this girls computer started to act up. While we waited for her to fix this, the previous line unfroze and people that were behind us moved through. Okay what the H E double hockey sticks.
Finally our till unfroze and we were rang up. While I was paying, I had my smoothie in my left arm and it started to leak all over my shoe and the floor. Just lovely. I apologized to the girl for the mess (only a few drops on the floor) and went on my way back to my truck. I get to my truck, put my smooth on my console and begin to drive over to the gas station, as I do that, the smoothie tips over and drips all over my right side. Now I have smoothie stains on my left and right side. Yay me.
I get gas, which was thankfully uneventful and then head the few minutes down the road to the ferry line up. As I pull up (at 11am) I realize it looks busy. I again choose the wrong line up but finally when I get to pay I get told I had missed the 12:15 ferry and would be on the 12:50. Thankfully it's a day where they have the extra sailing so the wait wasn't terrible. The ferry ride was uneventful as I stayed in my truck as usual, read a bit, napped a bit.
I then began the drive from Horseshoe Bay to Kitsilano where my sister lives. I get by Park Royal and am in the line up to go over Lions Gate Bridge. Traffic is pretty backed up. Not long later I look down and see the thermostat on my truck is maxed out and flashing at me. Uh oh, this is not good. Deciding that I do not want to be THAT person that breaks down on the bridge in rush hour traffic, I pull out of the line and head to the next exit to see what is going on.
Texts were sent out to Jason and his dad asking what to check. This turns into a 1 hour wait until my truck cools enough for me to try and remove the radiator cap, except there was ZERO success on that. It was on WAY too tight for me to even move it a millimeter. Not going to lie, during that hour I "might" have shed a tear or two. Okay I most definitely shed a tear or two. Not because my truck broke down, but because this was the SECOND time my truck broke down in a month.
In the end, I had to call BCAA to come and remove the radiator cap and put water in but it wasn't that low. The BCAA guy suggested to tow to my sisters just in case as he wasn't convinced that fixed the problem and traffic was still bad over the bridge. So tow # 1 was on and tow # 2 was on July 17. The crappy part was, I had a feeling it was going to happen and I even silently told my truck "please let me just get through this weekend" before I left.
I finally arrived to my sisters and my nieces were already in bed so I missed seeing them. Not exactly the ideal way to spend the night before race, sitting in a hot truck for 2 hours but that's life. The next morning I was up early and drove to the race. Provided I didn't get stuck in traffic and could keep the air flow going, I was okay to drive. I warmed up with speedy momma Shauna and before I knew it, we were on the line to go. I wasn't sure what to expect out of this race. I had quite the gap in workouts due to time off after the Sun Run so we were treating this race as a fitness test.
Rachel Cliff (one of my Asics Canada teammates) was running and she had just gotten back from FISU so I knew she was fit and I let her go. I was hoping to run around 35 minutes and in the end I ran 35:35 (results here) and held on for 2nd ahead of Lissa Zimmer.
First few km (pc: Frank Stebner)
For most of the race I heard cheering for Lissa due to the race being put on by her running club (VFAC) and I had no idea how close she really was. I was just doing my best to hold her off.
Last half of the race
I didn't look at any splits passed 1km because I didn't want to know, I just kept pushing without blowing up. I was a bit disappointed I didn't run closer to 35 flat, but it's the seawall and the seawall tends to be my enemy. It always gives me a huge mental battle and honestly for the first race back, I should be happy and not so hard on myself.
On the way to the finish (pc: Rick Horne)
In other news, it was a scary drive back to Horseshoe Bay the next day, but I made it. Thanks to VFAC for the great race and congrats to everyone who raced. It was definitely a warm day.
Top 3 men and women BC Champs
Timex Series awards
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