I had a secret

Back when I set my resolutions for the year I signed up for a road race.  One of my resolutions for this year was to amp up my running.  I knew that I needed to take a different approach because basically any hiccup in my routine would put me back to a walking pace.  Having a race ahead of myself was suppose to motivate me to keep with my training schedule.  I didn't really tell anyone about this race because I wasn't sure if I would actually run it.  Things like this make me extremely anxious.  Last week I ran 5 miles on the treadmill.  I was happy; my goal to be more consistent with my running and distance had been accomplished.  I no longer needed to RUN the race.  I am not a quitter though and I was pretty sure if I didn't run I would have been quite upset with myself. 

So this morning I woke up determined to run.  I was really nervous though.  The race didn't start till 11am.  I thought at sign up time this was a good thing however this morning I realized after getting up I had about 4 hours to think about all of the "what ifs" of the race.  I therefore did what any crazy person would do. 

I did the dishes.

Then I scrubbed the toilets.

I also finished folding clothes from yesterday, put them away, and completed a whole other load of laundry. I cleaned the coffee maker and pot really well and shook out all of the crumbs from the toaster oven.  Accomplished huh?

At 10am, I met a friend, Kari,  who was also running the race.  No we did not plan to match quite so well.  She is running for a charity and asked if I would wear the shirt.  The pink was just a coincidence. 

Us at the start.  Kari runs much faster than me so this is the last I saw of her till the finish line.  Thanks to Mr. J for being the supportive husband, carrying a bag of all my stuff and snapping photographs.  They came out great.

Notice the old man passing me at the end. He was one of several grey haired people to show me up.

Kind of looks like I am walking huh?  I promise I wasn't.  Thank goodness we had a bright, sunny day.  The wind was relatively light on the coast but the temperatures were still in the 40s.  Where did those 70 degree days go from Friday?

Approximate pace:

Mile 1 - 9 minutes

Mile 2 - 10 minutes

Mile 3 - 10 minutes

Mile 4 - 11 minutes

Mile 5 - 10 minutes

These are not the official times but I passed the clock at 50:23.  I was about 30 seconds behind the clock when I first passed the line.  Not bad I think.  I was not last and I was finished before 60 minutes which were my two goals.  I have no intention of ever running another race again. 

The best part was after the race when I scored Beer (Mr. J earned this one), a bagel from my favorite bagel shop, and some clam chowder.  I also earned a shirt which has a cute leprechaun shirt. 

Now you know my secret.