Error! Error!

I started off easy in Saturday's 10K. You know, "I'm not going to push it, I'm just here for a group run". I did actually go pretty easy in the first mile, but that was it. I don't think I have what it takes to jog a race. After a fast mile two, I had made up enough time to be close to PR pace.

I didn't know my 10K PR time off hand, but I remembered the pace - 7:23/mile. Every mile I checked the watch again, and it looked like if I could hold on I might just squeak out a PR. Crossing the finish line at 45:24 on my watch, I was pretty sure I had done it, but with a 6.2 mile race the arithmetic was more than I could face. I would just check the NYRR site for the official time later in the day.

Folks like me (old and slow) will never win one of these races, but we have other goals. Getting a PR is one, but there are others. Placing high in my age group, of course. I also like the "Age-graded performance level percent (AG %)". I dream of breaking the 70% mark. I've been getting closer, hitting 66.8% in my last race. At 70%, you are supposedly "regional class", and at some races, NYRR puts folks who have hit that mark in the front corral. Now that would be cool.

Later on Saturday, when I checked my results on line, the AG% was the first thing I saw - 72.2%!!! But wait, something was not right. The Net Time was listed at 41:10. That's not what MY watch said. The pace was listed at 6:38 -- no way. I checked the split times -- still stored on my watch. No way. NYRR had somehow knocked four minutes off my time.

Do runners check the results after races? Yes they do. I got several congratulatory emails from folks who knew my speed well enough to think that I had just run a killer race. It was tough to have to tell them that it wasn't so.

I sent an email to NYRR asking them to look into it. So far, no response. I posted to the Flyers forum, and another Flyer, JM, indicated that her time was off as well. As she put it, "if this stays on the books I may never PR again!"

It is odd, though, that NYRR came up with a faster time. How could that happen? Maybe I really am that fast....yeah...
;-)