Finished Running Gainesville's 10K Turkey Trot Race at Tacachale

This morning the annual Thanksgiving Turkey Trot 10K (6.2 miles) running race was held here in Gainesville on the woody grounds of Tacachale, a residential institution for the developmentally disabled.  Having just recently performed, without any extra exertion, a 10.3 mile training run, I felt that this would be a good "short-distance" race to prepare me for running in a public setting as I consider which half-marathons to enter in the near future.  A very rainy, stormy cold front had just swept through northern Florida the day before and the grounds were saturated.  Plus, the temperature overnight had plummeted down to around 40 as I left the house to drive the short distance to the race.  Although I knew I would be uncomfortable in the few minutes standing outside before the beginning of the race, I decided to stick to my time-tested formula of wearing a short-sleeved tee-shirt with shorts...and a very old, expendable pair of running shoes.  As I gathered with the many (it seemed like several hundred) other runners behind the starting line, I couldn't help chuckling to myself as I saw many wearing jackets and long pants: they'd be dying in those clothes before they got past the first mile!  Anyway, by the race's start the temperature had climbed up into the upper forties...it would be in the mid-fifties by race's end.  As for my shoes, I wisely foresaw the possibility of encountering some marshy areas on the race course, and sure enough, we were all warned about their existence before the race began.  But even with that, I was unprepared for the poor footing and many, many areas of standing water that we would need to slosh through...or look for a detour around.  This, I'm sure, ended up slowing down my final time, as well as the fact that I began the race toward the back of the pack and spent the first mile or two repeatedly being boxed in by slow runners and having to squeeze around them.  That all having been said, I enjoyed the race...although I was disappointed at the finish line when there was no clock showing the time as the runners passed though it.  Not having timed myself on my watch like I usually do, I'll just have to wait for the results to be posted online.  When they ARE finally posted, I'll put a link to them here.  There was an awards ceremony scheduled, but I decided to go on back home...from past experience and results, I don't think I had finished anywhere near the top three in my age group (55-59)...

Later...the final results have been posted. I finished 5th in my age group out of 13 runners with a time of 56:56.  It was a bit slower than my 2012 Turkey Trot time of 53:18, but as I wrote earlier, I had expected it.  Here is the link to the race results.