As
I sat there this morning waiting for the time to eat my gel (I ate one of the
gels that I got in my swag bag. It was a Clif Shot...chocolate. It was yum-o! Tastes way better
than the PowerBar chocolate gel) and then head to the start line in my
car in the rain...yea, that's right, it was raining...I was so very happy that
i thought to bring my Marmot rain jacket for just this reason.
I was also excited. I always get excited for a race, as
I'm sure most racers do.
Anyway,
I've never run in the rain before so it was a little tiny bit nerve wracking
that I might have to run in my rain jacket for the first time. However, about 30 minutes before the race was
supposed to start, it basically stopped raining, so I didn’t have to wear
it. But I’m glad I had the jacket,
regardless.
The
run took place on Camp Mabry in Austin, TX and was great; the route was beautiful. There
was some boy scouts camping on the base right at the second water stop and as runners
came running past them, they all extended their arms and their hands and gave
us all low-5’s as we ran by. That was
the coolest part of the run in my opinion!
I ran a little slow this time, but I think that was due to having been
at work all night and then having to run in the morning. But that’s weird to me because I can be awake
all day and then go run in the evening and get good split times. Oh well.
Maybe it was I just “felt” sluggish and wasn’t actually slow. I haven’t uploaded my Garmin data from this
morning yet, so I don’t know my actual average pace at this moment.
I
finished in 50:52 which landed me in the 142nd overall spot (I’m not
sure of exactly how many racers there were today, but around 500 registered),
and I was 12th in my age group!
How exciting is that?!?!?! Of course,
I didn’t get a finisher’s medal, they only give those out to the top 3 in each
age group, but that’s the best finish I’ve had!
I have a feeling that if I hadn’t been working all night and had
actually gotten sleep, that I might have ran a little closer to 10 minute miles
rather than the 11 minutes I did most of the way, and I might have gotten
closer to scoring a medal. Oh well. Next race I’ll make sure not to schedule an
overnight shift of overtime before a race.
Doofus that I am sometimes.
All
in all, it was a good race and I had fun.
Can’t wait to do this race again next year! It’s also a little bitter sweet. This is my last race until September because
there are simply no races other than triathlons, mud runs and foam runs from
the months of June to August. Lame. But, I’ll keep up my training and keep
bumping up my weekly long runs. Maybe I can
find a half marathon in August in north Texas to do. We shall see.
Oh! Speaking of half marathons…registration
for the Austin Marathon and Half Marathon goes live at midnight on June 1st. I will be online, waiting for the clock to
hit midnight and trying to be one of the first 1000 to register so I can get
the $70 rate instead of having to pay $80.
Sure, it’s only $10, but hey, $10 is $10 and every dollar counts in this
economy. I’m sure you agree.
Update:
here’s my Garmin stats from the 8K:
Overall,
I was faster than I thought I was. YAY!
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