My First 5K - Spooky Sprint 2010

Are we friends on Facebook? FB has made it waaaaaay too easy for me to post lil' family tidbits that I'd normally blog about on here.

Like when my friend, Tiffany, and I decided to do a practice run? On the actual path for the 5K?  And ended up finishing an 8K run instead, accidentally?

Yeah. Um... I've only ever ran on the treadmill at the gym. Had NO idea how much distance 3.1 miles would cover, but we had a copy of the map and just kept a lookout for "Aviation Rd" so we'd know when to turn around.

Of course, it's too much to ask for a street sign here in Podunk. So... we kept on running. And running. And finally, after about 2.5 miles, we decided to turn around.  Only reason I figured out how far we ran is coz I looked it up on Google Maps when I finally got home!

***

This was on a Thursday, two days before the race.  When Saturday morning rolls around, it brings along a 70% chance of rain. Greeeeaaaaaat.  But I've come way too far to back out now.  It may be a race, but I had NO ambitions of winning or even finishing in the top half.  All I wanted to do was cross the finish line.

And hopefully, not be last. But hey - I'll take what I can get.  I've never been a runner and after 3 weeks of training, one can't be too picky.

So... here we are, standing under an umbrella before the race starts:

Dette, Jamie and Tiffany

Counting down

Home stretch - Mama and Numbnuts running beside us!

Me, trippin' out that I actually did it :)

After a quarter of a mile, I got a little surprise. Hubz piled all three boys in the car with him and Mama and drove down a quarter of the way to cheer us on. The police told him he couldn't park there, but changed their minds when he told them what he was up to.

I wish you could've seen the Little Shit. He had his hands in the air and hollered, exasperated, "Go FASTER!" *lol* Cracked me up :)

In the end, I thought my heart was going to jump out of my chest and I was praying, "Please, please, please don't let me fall over. Please let me just get to the finish line."

And I did. Never mind my goal of finishing in under 35 minutes. I finished my first ever 5K in less than 33.

32:54

I wonder if I'll be able to get under 30 minutes for my next one... Guess we'll see!