Race Day Review

My morning started really early this morning. I set my alarm to go off at 5:00 am so that I would have plenty of time to wake up and get everything together before the race this morning. I actually ended up starting to wake up around 3:45, then 4:15, then 4:35 .. you get the idea.

Tim and I got to the race site about 7:20 this morning and met up with several of my friends from work who ran with us.

Me, Sam, Bailey and Bonnie

Before the race some military-type guy lead us in some stretching and calisthenics. Then we got going about 8:00. I made my way to the back of the crowd at the starting line because I was terrified of getting trampled after reading about that happening to people. As the race got going I weaved my way through the back of the pack and ended up fairly close to the front.

I breezed through the first 2 miles with no problem. Actually I was completely suprised at what my Garmin was saying my pace was. I didn't feel like I was running any faster than normal, but my heart rate was running in the 170s and my pace was in the 8:45 range. When I hit the beginning of the 3rd mile I got a side-stitch so bad that I almost couldn't run through the pain. It was sheer willpower that kept me going at that point. I kept telling myself that I knew I could finish and I didn't want to walk during my first race. At one point I was hurting so bad I seriously thought I was gonna puke on the side of the road. But somehow I pushed through and the pain eased off.

I forgot to look at the clock when I crossed the finish line, and oddly enough I also forgot to stop my Garmin for several seconds after I finished. I think my official time is going to be right about 28:45. But for now I'll give you the stats from my Garmin:

Total Time: 28:56
Mile 1: 8:59
Mile 2: 8:54
Mile 3: 9:24

Here are a few pictures from after the race:

Tim and I

As if running wasn't enough, Tim and I decided to go moutain biking afterwards because the weather was actually decent. Its been raining for about 2 weeks straight and this is the first clear day we've had in a while. We biked a 4 mile trail at Swayback Bridge Trail. After we got home from that I was exhausted and starving!

I heated up a Morningstar Spicy Black Bean Burger and chopped it up on top of some Tostitos Scoops and made a huge taco salad out of it.

Overall it was a really great day and I'm glad to have my first 5K behind me. Next up is the Capitol City 5K on October 3rd. That one's going to be a toughy, a good portion of it is up some pretty serious hills. I've also signed up to run a 5K called the Turkey Burner on my birthday, November 21st. I thought that would be a fun thing to do for my birthday.