My town (Merrimack) hosts a 4th of July 5k race each year, which has become quite popular. Surprisingly there aren't a lot of July 4th races to choose from in NH. Also surprising is the fact that Merrimack ONLY hosts one race for the entire year. Seems like there should be more....
I generally don't like 5k races, even ones which are 5 minutes from my house. So I had to make it a challenge just to commit to running. While running the day before I told myself if I ran the last mile of my training run under 6 min pace then I would run the Sparkler 5k. Ran 5:15. Crap.
Nice day for racing though. A little rain, temps a little cooler than normal and a nice 8am start. Sweet. I had a decent race, happy with my results. The last time I ran this race I ran 18:04 (back in 2005). This year I ran 18:08. I got passed by 2 of the 3 masters in front of me during the last 1/2 mile or so. I need to work on my kick (or lack there of). I used to be pretty confident in the last mile or so of a race. Now I just try to hang on and not fall apart. Good race overal.
