First Pacing Gig

After Sundays half, Monday was an easy 7 miles at around 8 minute pace. The legs felt tired but not sore.
Tuesday was better, 9 miles back towards 7:30 pace, and the legs felt pretty much recovered. My cough was all but gone too which made me feel a lot stronger than the last two weeks.
On Wednesday I was due to head out after work and the wife's Pilates class, plan for an easy six.
However, today there was a local half on for a cancer charity, and our club had been asked to supply pacers. A late shout out came as they were short, so I decided to offer my services for a 1:40 pacer.
When I asked how many were planned to pace the 1:40, I got a bit nervous when it was just me.
On top of that, 1:40 was to be the fastest pacer for the half, there was also a 10k distance.
So no pressure then. So the pace calculator said 7:37 for a 1:39:30. Given that the garmin usually reads long, I decided to err on the side of caution, and set 7:34 on the watch.

The day was beautiful. I had run this course two years ago, and it is very hilly, a lot more so than Sundays race. There was a large field for the 10k, but disappointingly there were just over 80 runners for the half. I got my balloon, and took my place quite close to the start.
Off we went in glorious sunshine. Initially I felt it difficult to hold the pace back. My natural instinct at the start of a race is to race. I banked about 10 seconds on the first mile, and then settled in to pretty much the exact pace.
For the first two miles I was pretty much on my own, runners either ahead or behind. But not long after, we became a merry little group of 5 runners.
I was trying to assess who would struggle later on. At about 8 miles we lost our first, and I slowed the pace a bit to try and keep him, but we were in danger of losing it, so eventually I had to drop him.
10 miles was the next casualty, same story.
So three of us left. The remaining two were guys of a similar age to myself. Earlier, I has established that one had a PB of 1:45, and the other 1:55. They were still strong enough, and I spent the last three miles talking them through every hill, trying to keep them going.
On the last mile I looked behind, and there was no one even close, so I decided to push my two guys on, and they responded excellently. I was a bit worried I would miss the time, but we finished at 1:38:45. The two guys were over the moon, and they hugged me, more than once! Thanking me for pushing them on to great PB's. It was a great feeling to have helped them and I really enjoyed the run.
The down side was that I felt really guilty for finishing over a minute fast. I stood at the line, waiting to see the next runner in, who finished in 1:40:45. Could I have slowed and gotten him in under the 1:40? But then the two guys who had worked so hard to stay with me so long would not have achieved what they did.
This pacing thing is not easy on the mind! When I pushed on, there was nobody in sight behind, so I think I did the right thing, but if I get another go, I think I will be more accurate. But I really enjoyed the day, and it was a nice little training run.