Desert Classic Marathon 2007

With this marathon coming only three weeks after the Rock 'N' Roll Marathon, I was faced with that conundrum, is it better to train for the next marathon, or recover from the previous one? And of course, I didn't really do either.
I went into the Desert Classic hoping to be able to take a shot at 3:30 again, but I wasn't up to the challenge. It was a small marathon, only 42 finishers. The course couldn't be more simple, straight out and back, twice, on a flat blacktop road. It's generally rolling uphill going out, and generally rolling downhill on the way back. It's never steep.
The wind can be a problem on this course, but not this time. On the second loop, there was a little bit of a headwind on the return trip, but basically I was just really tired after about 17 miles.
The weather was good. It was cold at the start, but not bad, and I threw off my hat and gloves at the halfway turnaround at the start/finish line.
My 3:41:08 was good enough for an age group third place. Everyone ahead of me in my age group, and most of the lead runners, were from out of state.

1.   7:44 0:07:44
2.   8:00 0:15:44
3.   7:38 0:23:22
4.   7:41 0:31:04
5.   7:50 0:38:55
6.   7:51 0:46:46
turnaround
7.   7:34 0:54:20
8.   7:39 1:02:00
9.   7:30 1:09:30
10.  7:47 1:17:17
11.  8:08 1:25:26
12.  7:58 1:33:25
13.  7:56 1:41:22
turnaround
14.  8:07 1:49:30
15.  8:23 1:57:53
16.  8:33 2:06:26
17.  8:24 2:14:51
18.  8:54 2:23:46
19.  9:15 2:33:01
turnaround
20.  8:38 2:41:40
21.  8:36 2:50:16
22.  9:21 2:59:38
23. 10:00 3:09:38
24. 10:51 3:20:30
25. 10:13 3:30:43
26.  9:38 3:40:22
26.2 0:45 3:41:08