Free 5K

Saturday I did something crazy! I ran my first 5K post pardum without having trained for it, in 100+ heat index. Some might call it dumb. But whatever.  I needed something to jump start my fitness level and I'm competitive and love races, so why not. (At least I used to love races back when I never batted an eye at a lousy 3 miles.) Folks, between the extra 30 lbs, the heat, and the "I haven't gone running for a couple months" it was a pretty hard race!  I didn't want to sign up in the first place, but we got a flyer at work for a FREE 5K and I sent it on to my girlfriends which then made me be accountable.  Billie, more than half way through her pregnancy, was more than willing to run it so what excuse did I have?? So, two days before the race I signed up. 

I've never run in a race that wasn't some sort of charity fundraiser so I didn't know what to expect.  It was being hosted by 3 men, and the race was actually on one of their properties.  We pulled up and there were a ton of people. (It hadn't been advertised on the running website so we didn't know how much it would spread through word of mouth. But Hello, FREE spread.) There were local police directing the parking lots. The individual who owns this land, seems to own about half of this town (kinda a joke but maybe not? His name is everywhere) but I'd never been to his property. Um, it was beautiful.  It looked like a park and was pristine. (Even during the race there were people cleaning up the used water cups so everything stayed looking nice.)   He has a whole paved running path around his property (think acres and acres of horse farms - except no horses because he's in the railroad industry).  We picked up our numbers and saw that it was chipped timing! Really? Chipped timing for a free race? Half of the charity races we pay for in town don't have chips! We went to line up to race and the horn was a train horn. So cute but it scared me half to death. 

Me (& my not cute bump), Billie (& her cute little bump) and Courtney

(I just noticed the guy in the background with his shirt off. Does he really have a tramp stamp on his back?)

Courtney stayed with us for about the first mile.  After that I needed a walk so she ran ahead and Billie stayed back with me. I'm pretty sure I've only ever walked once while in an actual race and that was during my first 10K a couple years ago.  I just do not allow myself to walk, but I couldn't help it on Saturday.  The race had two water stations and even a port-a-potty (with RJ's logo on it- of course). We joked that everything on his property had his business logo on it. And at the drink table when we picked up our cold bottled water during the race? Yep. RJ's logo on the water! So funny. Anyway, the heat and humidity and lack of training really caught up to me and instead of pushing I took walking breaks.  Thankfully Billie was ok with that. It ended up that they had one ambulance on site for emergencies and had to call in 3 others. I've never seen that before...but then I've never raced in these conditions. It kind of jolted me when I saw an athletic guy on the side of the trail being helped by the EMTs with an oxygen mask on. Scary.  I think everyone was ok after the race though.

We got to the end of the race and crossed the finish line running! Yay us! There were buckets of gatorade and water waiting and they had enticed us before the race with iced towels but by the time we finished they were out of towels. Bummer. I guess that's what happens when you have a free race. How do you gauge how many will show up?  Oh and I guess that's also what you get for being slow. We looked at the race clock at mile 2 and made a joke that two years ago we had finished a 5K in less time than it took us to get to mile 2.  

RJ had a catering company grilling up lunch for people and also My Old Kentucky Home was there making homemade ice cream. The ice cream HIT the spot after being so overheated. Oh my. I think that was the best vanilla ice cream I've ever had! All of it was, get this, FREE!

Oh, and for the winners of each age category they gave away free running shoes and everyone with a bib number on got 50% off running shoes and there was an actual company set up selling running gear! I didn't buy any but wow. That's pretty good.

I got a serious blister on the back of my ankle because my shoes are still new-ish since I bought them post Adalyn and have only run a total of 5 times post Adalyn. My shoe got bloody which means that I'm hard core right? No pain no gain and all of that stuff?  Thankfully I wear flip flops to work because I'm still rocking the blister, although now that I ran Saturday I don't want to wait too long to go running again.  Gotta keep the momentum up! I know from the past that each run gets easier and easier. Now it's just on my shoulders to make the time to get those runs in!