Jingle Bell Run

I have been running only for the past two months, and I am beginning to miss the bike. After the Houston Half-Marathon, I will be happy to get back into multisport training. Two weekends ago I decided to sign up and run the Jingle Bell Run. Only the top 20 runners receive an award, a Pearl Izumi printed running shirt, a highly coveted item that brings out Houston's fastest runners. I signed up for the race with my main intent being to place in the top 20 or just to jog it if I wasn't in striking distance. *Note Lengthy Race Description Follows* I had looked at the results for the race over the past 5 years and noted that the 20th time was usually somewhere between 29 mins and 29:45. I felt confident that I was prepared to break 30 mins and to set a new PR. At the race I noted that a top female from the UT XC team was running and that she would probably run around 29:45 for the 5 mile race. The gun sounded and the runners bolted. I ran hard to stay with the large pack putting me somewhere in the range of 10-30th place. As we crossed the first mile marker in 5:20 the pack began to break up as the strong head wind began to pick up. I slipped in behind a runner and within seconds our entire pack was one long pace line. The pack broke up more as we went through the second mile in 5:30 and I was now in a group of four. At the turn around on Shepherd, one of the runners in our group picked up the pace and opened up a 50 meter lead over the next half mile. The three of us began throwing the punches picking up the pace on the downhills and the uphills. The little changes in speed definitely hurt, and I continually wanted to "jog". Our third mile was in 5:40 and I was hurting. I do not remember anything from the fourth mile except that it was in 5:54, the pace was really hurting on all the underpasses we were making underneath Waugh, Montrose and Studemont. As we kicked into the final mile we caught one runner and spit him out the back. With about a kilo to go I picked up the pace significantly and opened up a 4 meter gap, but they held me there and closed in with 300 meters to go. About 150 meters out we were three across going into the final turn and I was on the inside. We made the turn into the final stretch and we were closing on the fourth running that had broken away at the turnaround. As the three of us sprinted towards the finish I hear "19th runner, 20th runner-last award". I held on to finish 2nd in our group of three in the sprint as we finished right behind the break-away runner. There were four of us in the shoot so I assumed I had finished 21st and was quite disgusted that I didn't finish in the top 20. As we walked towards the end of the shoot they were handing out place cards and I watched the runner in front of me get handed the last card, my heart dropped. It was confirmed, I was 21st. I dropped my head and then saw the lady take a card back from the runner, two cards had stuck together! I was 20th and he was 19th! I had done it, I finished 20th, and set a PR of 28:35. My heart the sunk again as I turned around to shake the 21st runners hand and tell him great race, but I knew was in his mind: "No, not a great race, I just finished 21st." See you at the Half-Marathon in January!