Back again, quick turnaround just 16 days from the 25km Champs, to race Bolder Boulder. Another Pet? Next race drop? Let’s get into it.

Bolder Boulder Recap

After the 25K Championships, Dathan and I were pretty loose about racing again on such a short turnaround—but a world-class 10K in your own backyard is hard to pass up. The two weeks between the races went smoothly: I hit some good workouts and felt like I was recovering well, so we decided to give it a shot.

Going into this race, I knew the field was stacked: Conner Mantz (American half marathon record holder), Daniel Ebeneyo (10K silver medalist at the Budapest World Championships), Addisu Gobena (Houston Half champ, 59:17, 2:05 marathoner), Asefa Boki (2:05 marathoner), and Haymanot Alew (Berlin Marathon champ, 2:03), just to name a few. My plan was to commit to the early hot pace, hang tough, and let the altitude and hills help break up the pack. I’ve always considered myself a strong altitude racer, so I was looking forward to testing that.

From the first 800 meters, though, my legs felt heavy. I still wanted to give myself a chance to settle in, so I pushed to stay with the leaders. We went through the mile in about 4:22, but by the time we turned back onto Folsom at 2K, I knew I had to let the lead pack go—or I’d be walking by 5K.

From there, I found myself in a strong chase pack with Aidan Reed, Hillary Bor, Drew Hunter, and probably a few others I can’t quite remember. We kept the leaders in sight and took turns trying to bridge the gap to Addisu Gobena, who was starting to fall off the front group of Biya, Connor, and Ebeneyo. At times, we had him within 10 seconds, but no one in our pack felt good enough to completely close the gap. Aidan ended up finishing 5th, I came in 6th, and Drew faded to 11th. Those finishes were enough to earn Team USA White a second-place result in the team standings.

While 6th place wasn’t the result I was aiming for, I’m proud of it—and hey, I ran the same time Conner Mantz ran to win this race last year and beat a slew of 59 minute half marathoners and 2:03-2:05 marathoners.

That said, it was still a bit frustrating—not due to a lack of fitness or willingness to put myself out there. It was just the first time this spring I felt like I didn’t have the legs on the day. One rule of thumb Dathan uses is that every mile you race takes one day to recover. With the Grand Rapids race being about 16 miles and the Bolder Boulder coming exactly 16 days later, maybe I just wasn’t fully recovered. Still, I don’t regret pushing the envelope to give myself a shot at a great day. I think it’s important to show up, even when you’re not feeling 100%.

Now, I’m looking forward to settling back into the training cycle for about four weeks before racing again at the B.A.A. 10K.

Training updates

Not a ton to report from the last two weeks, except that the rest of this “season” before I reset will be focused on races 10K and under. So, we’ll be putting a bit more emphasis on track work, while still keeping some marathon-style training in the mix to maintain long-term focus. I plan to reset in early July to start building toward fall races, so until then, I’m just racing whatever excites me. No firm plans beyond the B.A.A. 10K yet, but I’m hoping to fit in one or two races on the track.

The Klecker house update

The most notable event in the last two weeks at the Klecker house was the addition of our second cat—bringing us to 2 dogs, 2 cats, and 2 people. Sage and I decided that Lucy needed a companion so she wouldn’t be lonely when we travel for races. We rescued a 16-year-old cat from the Boulder Humane Society named Jane. I’m not in love with the name, but after 16 years, I don’t think we can change it.

She came with an ear infection and fresh wounds in her mouth from having half her teeth removed. For the first five days, she ate almost nothing, and we were honestly scared she was preparing to die. But on Sunday, she finally started eating her liquid diet and getting enough calories to put weight back on.

She now sleeps about 23 hours a day, but during the one hour she’s awake, she loves sitting in the window and soaking up the sunshine—something she couldn’t do during her month-long stay at the Humane Society.

Sage also got back on the track after her trip to China, winning the Sound Running 800 in wire-to-wire fashion with a time of 1:59. She’ll soon be heading to Europe for about three weeks to continue her 800m campaign.

The sourdough starter has been thriving in the warmer weather, and the pizzas lately have been some of my best yet.

Thanks for reading! Let me know if there's anything else you’d like to hear about.