He might have been surprised by the race start, where people that are just over a jog, crowd the starting line, and then run side-by-side to block the trail....
I didn't get close enough to the front at the start, but it didn't really affect the race for me. I started out a bit slow because I didn't want to blow up. The first few miles I would just chase after the person in front of me, pass them, and then chase down the next person. I spent the whole second half of the race chasing a group of three, but I wasn't able to catch them. I was planning to keep them in closing distance and sprint past them at the finish, but that last mile hurt too much and they beat me by like 20 seconds.
My official time was 41:53, which is 6:44/mile. I didn't really have any goals or expectations before the race, so I'm pretty happy with the results. If I didn't ride Wildcat three of the four days before the race, and if I didn't have beers the night before, then I might have been able to take 5th overall, but whatev's. I still got to slam three bagels after the race and then got beer from @fidodie, so that's a win in my book.
It was a fun and well run event, and I'll do it again next year.