For those who don't know, DFL stands for Dead Last. You can figure out the "F" on your own.

I finished in 1:10:something (probably a little less if you count when I crossed the start line). That's like 11:29, which is ok for what I've been running lately and puts me 10 up from the bottom of my age/gender, if you look at last year's numbers and probably ahead of 25% of the runners in this year's race (according to my eyeball estimate). So not incredible, but it's about what I was targeting based on my conditioning, etc. This was what I could do running my own race.

The experience was pretty good. I used the "Running on Air" breathing cadences, which were very helpful. Because of this, I didn't start overly fast. And, halfway through the race, when I thought "I'm tired," I didn't just acknowledge it and put it in my back pocket, I was able to do something about it besides slowing down. I changed to the more intense cadence 2:1, which gave me an instant boost of energy and helped me succeed through the last half of the race.

Every mile I've put in, every hill I've run, all of the thought I've put into my form came together in this race. When I felt slow, I did a mental check of my form that allowed me to speed up a hair without forcing the pace or overstriding. I actually enjoyed aggressively attacking the hills and running down the other side. Since I'm pretty practiced, I don't feel like they used much more energy than the level (and they were tiny hills). I opened up through the .1 mile at the end of the race and finished with everything I had. It was pretty awesome.

Except my official time might be DFL. If you're unfamiliar with races, the last runner doesn't find out that they're last when the final results come in. They actually have to run the race about four feet in front of two police cars and an F250, who are there in case anything goes wrong. It can feel mortifying.

So I gave a fist pump to the girl who was running in that position when the race looped back on itself at the turn around. She started, she was out there, she was running. And she was running a harder race than my own. She deserved some acknowledgement.

After I collected my t-shirt and was walking back down the race course to my car, I see her at the 6 mile marker. Still being tailed by her entourage. But finishing. That's commitment and tenacity and everything that I respect as a runner. And nobody should have to finish alone.

I ask her if I could run with her the rest of the way or if it would be an imposition. She invited me to run. So I told her how cool I thought she was and complemented her on finishing strong and told her that her time was pretty good (officially, probably less than a 14 minute mile - that would have been a great easy run for me about 6 weeks ago). I finished with her, completely forgetting about my chip. After getting a hug from her (she was like, "I don't know you, but..." and offered the hug. I responded, "but you're a runner" and took it because us both being new runners makes her kind of like family, right?) I left her with her friends who were waiting at the finish line.

I'm a little frustrated that I didn't remember to run outside of the the corral, that my official time might not reflect the race I ran, etc, etc. I'm not going to know how it was recorded for a couple of weeks. But, finally, I'm as proud of that race as of my real finish time. It was an honor to run with somebody who was putting everything she had out there that day.