Turkey Trot Race

Just a few thoughts about the race on Sunday (mentioned here).

The race was nice in some aspects. But it was a free race. Which meant no chips, no shirt, no awards. It also meant that over 8000 people were running/walking it. It was crazy packed the entire race. My time was okay, but not the best because as soon as I would navigate around someone I would find another person in my way. Not sure if I'll run this one again next year or not.

Now on to Thursday's race.

A friend of mine was running his first 5k. So the competitiveness in me wanted to make sure I beat him. Reality is that he's probably better than me. But I couldn't let him beat me when I've been running for over a year (in fact my first 5k was the Turkey Trot last year) and this was his first race.

They shot an actual cannon.

I ran pretty well until the hill of death. But just as I was beginning to wear out and consider walking (in part because my asthma was becoming an issue) I saw my friend up ahead. So I powered through and got a head of him. Then it was a fight to stay ahead. 

My dad had told me that I needed to beat my time from Sunday by at least 30 seconds. As I finished climbing the hill and was beginning the last bit before the downhill finish I realized that I might actually beat my PR (personal record) of last years race. I had gotten a time of 29:46 and hadn't beaten it since. My dad met me at the top of the last hill and we ran the rest of the way in. I was done, but came in at 29:37. Woohoo!!!

Jon wasn't use to me wearing this shirt (it was the race shirt so half the runners were wearing the same thing) so he missed me taking off.

Coming in. I was done, let me tell you.

So thanks to my friend (who I beat by the way) and my dad, I pushed it to get another PR. Strangely, in a race that has a monster hill. Now to get back into training for my half.

Daddy and I run a 10k in January. It will be my first 10k so I'm excited to see how I do.