Oh, Right, I Ran A Race

I keep starting and deleting this post.  As excited as I was about my kids' race, I was less than thrilled about my race, and now that it's behind me I kind of just want to move on.

Other than crippling shin pain and some adorable karaoke singers, there was nothing remarkable about this race.  But. I did promise a report, and really, what else are you doing right now?  You have five minutes to spare, right?  Right.  So, here we go....

After my kids finished their race and we hugged and high-fived and found a donut for my daughter, I said my goodbyes and headed to line up for the 5K.  This 5K was billed as being for runners and walkers, so when I lined up in the back of the pack, I assumed I'd be with all the slower runners and the handful of walkers.

Ever heard that saying about assuming?  Yup.  I'm an ass.

"Ready! Set! Go!"  . . . and we're off.  Down the school drive, turn left, turn right, and we're running down the only real hill in the neighborhood.  (Thank you to the race directors who realized that going DOWN this hill was preferable to running UP it)  While I'm running at what seems like a relatively fast pace (but can't be, after all, I'm with all the back of the packers, right?), I'm hearing this guy giving non-stop instruction to his young son.

How to hold his head, how to place his feet, how to run tangents, how to breathe.  It was rather excruciating for me to listen to, I can't imagine how it was for his son.  After a few minutes, I realized my shins were hurting.  Why are my shins hurting?  *glance at my watch*  Ooooh...  10:xx pace.  THAT's why my shins are hurting.  That's my "I feel great!" 5K PR pace. I was supposed to be running this thing at 12:xx.   Back of the pack pace, people.  What the heck?

So I slowed down considerably, but still hit the 1st mile  marker at 11:3x.   Whoopsie.  The rest of the race was a fairly agonizing run/walk, with my shins hating me, me wishing I was not in my own neighborhood having a rather crappy race, all the while smiling and waving to neighbors that were sitting outside of their house cheering us on.

I knew going into this race that it would not be anywhere CLOSE to a PR, but I was kind of hoping that I could at least run it feeling ok.  It wasn't to be.  Fortunately, even going slowly, 5Ks are super short and over fairly quickly.   As I neared about the 2.5 mile mark, I came upon a pair of girls with a karaoke machine, with the soundtrack from Frozen blaring.

I love Frozen.  (Yes, I'm 35 and I like kids' movies.  I'm ok with that.)  Hearing the music (I swear to you, I'm going senile, because even though it was YESTERDAY, I cannot remember what song was playing), I started to feel better about the day - though my shins still really freaking hurt.  Plus, the girls were really cute (though the one holding the microphone wasn't singing at all, just kind of staring off into space).

Rounded yet another corner, walked some more, then started running when I hit the school again and headed towards the finish line.

Anyone else turn magenta when they run?

Since I wasn't really paying attention to my pace after my disastrous first mile, I was surprised to see 37:xx on the clock as I finished.  My PR time is 35-something, so considering the huge amount of walking I'd done, I was expecting to be a lot slower.

Results haven't been posted yet (and I probably won't bother to search for them anyway), but my Garmin said 3.08 in 37:36.  12:13/mile.   Not my worst, not my best - I'm just happy my shins stopped hurting after awhile.

The funniest thing about this whole day was that my husband and I were walking around looking at all the booths that were set up at the school and we passed a sign that had my name on it.  Turns out I'd won a raffle that I didn't know about.  5 names of volunteers were randomly drawn and I was one of the winners.   So for my 4 minutes of service, I got a $15 restaurant gift card!

All in all it was a fun day for the community and my kids had a great time, but it was certainly not a real "race" day for me.  Even if my shins hadn't acted up, I'm not sure I would have put my all into this race.  My heart was certainly not in it.

On to the next.   St. Michael's half marathon in 2 weeks.  Hoping my shins cooperate for that one!

Step Sisters Ribbon Run

On Saturday morning, I got up bright and early and drove 65 miles or so to Ashburn, VA to meet up with some "internet folk" at the Step Sisters Ribbon Run, a 5K & 10K run for breast cancer.

It was colder than I was expecting and the wind was crazy stupid, but the sun was shining and I was happy to meet my friends in person for the first time, after having been talking to them online for quite awhile now.  (They were just as awesome in person, in case you're wondering!) 

Of course I am an idiot and took NO pictures.  But you guys have imaginations.  Pretend, ok? 

The idea for the 5K was for me to just do my super-slow running and meet up with people at the end.  I had no intention of actually trying to race this thing.  I ended up hanging with K for most of the race, and she's faster than I am, so I was actually going at a fairly steady clip for awhile.  Faster than I should have, that's for sure.  Around 2.4 miles, my right shin (the one that loves me SO MUCH) started to speak up and I knew I needed to slow down/walk if I had any chance of running my race the next day.  So I told K to go on ahead, and I walked for a few minutes.   

I picked up the pace again in the last 2/10 of a mile or so and ran in it - hey, even if it's not a "real" race, you can't walk across the finish line, right? 

(Thanks to W for this picture!)

I think my time for this one was somewhere around 38 minutes, which is slower than my fastest 5Ks, but faster than my slowest 5Ks, so I'll take it.  It beats sitting on the couch all morning, in any case. 

After I finished we hung out for awhile, waiting for the rest of K's family to finish, then we all went to breakfast at a great place called Mimi's.  They had fun looking mimosas on the menu but since W & K were treating me, I felt bad adding $8 to my meal, so I didn't have one.  I will be making my own soon, though.

When breakfast was over, we said our good-byes and I headed home.  At that point, I had no idea what I was going to do about Sunday's race.  My shin hurt, my calf was tight, and I was just overall tired from a stressful week, and not enough sleep.   It would have to be a race-day decision.  

Would I drop down to the 5K?  Stay home and sleep? My alarm was set for 4:45 a.m.   Time would tell.   Details tomorrow. =)

Did you race this weekend? Have you ever done two (or more) races in one weekend?