XI. Pick Street Running Festival

Early October there was a running event in Szeged named after the local salami trademark, Pick. You could choose from a 6km distance, a 3.4k or a 1.2k family group run. And of course there were several fill-in programmes in between, and some lottery at the end, all the usual stuff.
I opted to run the 6km as I knew beforehand that the 3.4km would be very crowded to achieve any decent time. And of course I was feeling kinda running-pro (Gebre beware) so there was the übermensch feeling of 'yeah I run the long one' added, too :) I've entered Peter and myself for the shorter one, too but as Peter had a training that time it was obvious we would skip running together this time.
In the morning it was quite chilly but clear so I was a bit uncertain what to put on - I chose the long outfit however. It later turned out to be the perfect choice, sometimes it was wee bit too warm but in a minute it would cool down due to the wind. Ah yes, the wind was quite strong, 18km from the North. But at least it was not raining :)
Due to organizational problems I had to solve this event all alone, so there were no cheer-girls (Moira and Aniko) this time. Too bad, they could have made quite a few photos entitled 'Daddy suffering' or 'Dad is dead'...
Drove there, warmed up, had a light jog and some gymnastics - and bang, The Urge hit me: where is the looooooo... only 10 minutes left... trick or treat... or is it dare to win?... nah, let's be brave, no time for such crazy things. Got near the starting line where many of the folks were facing the wrong way??? Something I did not know of before, some late changes to the route??? I've taken a place at the second part of the field and then in a moment the organizers told the majority that they were facing the wrong way - yessssss, I was right \o/. So I found myself in the 6th or 7th line at the start :)
Off went the gun and we were running. I tried to keep calm and chose a pace I knew I was OK with. Some early birds left me of course but I knew I could not run that pace so I did not bother. When we reached the river and turned North on the quay the headwind hit us. I was using good old cyclist tactics, hiding behind someone for some time and then leave him/her and jump up a position. You may call this opportunism or un-ethical but I've learned this all my youth and it was a race after all... I've run this way till the first turning point and then almost enjoyed running tailwind, but started to feel not-so-good. Running didn't feel comfortable at all. Well I've climbed the ramp up, left the quay and then soon came another turning point and I was quite afraid of the headwind quay section waiting for me. But at this point I've just reached up to a man and decided to start the headwind section behind him. And in fact I traveled there from this point onto the finish line, suffering badly.
Right before the last turning point that was positioned at the end of the quay (so you even had to run up the ramp) we've caught a tall girl (FSz, I know she's been running for quite some time) and later I learned she was the 6th in the women's race and even she couldn't keep up our pace. Then about 300m from the finish we caught the women's 5th and 'my rabbit' and she seemed to know eachother, as he told her she was 5th and keeping that pace would finish under 25 minutes. Now I looked at my watch and was really shocked to see it was true -  too bad the heart-rate was blinking at 100% :) Well we finished soon, and I thanked my rabbit the help immediately. Too bad there is no official ranking for outside-top-10 finishers so I don't know his name :(
I felt completely tired and exhausted but tried to keep on walking. From time to time I glanced at my watch and couldn't believe: 24:54??? I slowly came to realize it was only a little bit worse than 4 min/km pace. OMGWTF, I hoped for a 28:00. Yet I felt very tired, completely useless but very happy. This whole event didn't feel good at all. Mid-distance I was like 'ah forget it, stupid me, just ease off and walk away'. But still somehow managed to finish and achieved such a good result. Wohooo!!!
Then I had a choco bar and some water and met an old classmate from secondary. We talked a bit though talking didn't feel right either and it was getting chilly again, being wet. Then I jogged to the car and drove home. Up the stairs it was very hard but later the day I've regenerated completely, so next day I could do an almost 15km run at 5:40/km pace with Peter following on bike, talking. Superman, right? :D