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<\/a><\/p>\nI loved the event as I thought it impeccably organized and with its space theme, water stations had devised costumes from various sci-fi flicks.\u00a0 These two were at the SpaceBalls water stop and I met them at the end.\u00a0 Lord Helmet had to leave her headpiece in the car as it was giving her a neck pain… and it kept bopping people as she walked around.\u00a0 So I digitally re-created it for my archives.<\/p>\n
In 2012, I ran a then personal best time of 3:19:19.\u00a0 Again, loved the vibe and the costumes of runners — I don’t remember if Jabba\/Leia and the Flash beat me.\u00a0 I think Leia did for sure.<\/p>\n 2013 was the infamous they cashed my check and yet claimed I never registered so they wouldn’t let me run. To the race directors great credit, they bent over backwards in the following weeks to try and make amends.<\/p>\n I returned with a free entry in 2014 to make up for the snafu, posting a 3:35:16.<\/p>\n A course personal worst came about in 2015 with a heartbreaking 3:51:55.\u00a0 My mom wanted to come with me and I told her I was going to crush the course… the course crushed me.<\/p>\n In 2016, I rallied back with a 3:20:32 that I deemed a successful failure<\/a> as I was really hoping to break my course PR… and maybe even qualify for Boston. That didn’t happen.\u00a0 And by now the costumes had grown… uninspired.\u00a0 It was as if the rose was off the bloom… Crackers and Cheese!\u00a0 I always mix that up — the bloom was off the rose.<\/p>\n 2017 saw me racing in Myanmar at the Bagan Temple Run<\/a>.<\/p>\n I thought I was done with the Space Coast Marathon… but they pulled me back in with an entry fee I couldn’t resist and a means to shave off some Thanksgiving calories. And so in 2018 I once again blasted off with the Space Coast Marathon.<\/p>\n It was so humid that my phone was incapable of sliding open to get to my camera, so only a few shots… and honestly, it’s the same course every year with just a few minor tweaks that proved, um, disorienting to me.<\/p>\n I slowed as the miles piled up, and my aspirations for a BQ time or even a new personal course record evaporated.\u00a0 Plus, they moved the finish line to address prior year congestions in the closing meters. But that meant we passed what I used to think was the finish… and when you think you’re done and turns out you still have another 0.3 miles to go… it’s really, really, ridiculously really hard to power through.<\/p>\n I’m a guy with no kick anyway but, man, I just about stumbled over the finish. I was ahead of the 3:25 Pacer the whole time… and in the closing footfalls I thought she was going to pass me. But thankfully she was running just SLIGHTLY ahead and had to slow up to hit her pace time. Thank goodness she was a stickler for pacing rules… even though all of her pace group had fallen off and it was just her holding a 3:25 stick.<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a> <\/a><\/p>\n<\/a> <\/a><\/p>\n<\/a> <\/a><\/p>\n<\/a> <\/a><\/p>\n<\/a> <\/a> <\/a><\/p>\n