I run therefore, I am!

I got to Florida on Saturday Afternoon. Got my rental car and drove up the coast from Ft. Lauderdale to Melbourne to get my race packet. I was planning on sleeping in the rental car by the beach but saw signs posted no overnight parking. So I grabbed a hotel at the Super 8. It was 2 blocks from the start. I went to the start Sunday and immediately was hoarded by press. They saw my bib and found I was from Utah. Either that or I must've looked pretty hot. Lol I felt like royalty as our bibs we wore had a separate bib on the back for the Masters championships. The weather was warm and I did a mile warmup. It was misty in the morning. So humid you cut cut it with a knife. I lined up right at the start line next to Tracy who took second in this last year. I planned on going out and sticking with him. He found I was from Utah and asked how Dennis Simonaitis was. The gun went off and it was a fast 40 year old that was pushing a 4:50 pace immediately. Not me. I let him go and got next to Tracy Lokken. Our first mile was 5:13. I was tired for some reason from the get go. It was a burden to breath and I swear I felt like I had a humidifier blowing on me at close range. A constant mist. I slowed the pace on mile toe to 5:24. I really wanted to stay on 5:20 pace or close to it. I was in 5th position at mile 3 and the leader was out of site from the fog that was about a 1/4 mile visible. I seemed to be burdened by my breathing. I tried not to focus on it but my heart rate wouldn't come down. It was a push every mile after that to stay going strong. The more I pushed the less it seemed I was going faster. I hit 5:34,544,546,552,542 to mile seven. We had a long uphill bridge that slowed me a bit but the downhill let me pull away from the pack of a few guys and one 40 year old masters lady. The course was flat. I'm not used to courses that make you push hard the entire way. All of Utah courses give us a break of downhill to relax a bit. Not today. I ended up 5th overall and 3rd age master. If I would've felt good enough to challenge Tracy or even stayed with him I would've hit 1:10-1:11. When I came in the finish I looked like I just came out of a lake. I was soaked from head to toe from the humidity. I don't hardly sweat so it was a different kind of running for me. The temps got up to 90 by noon.