Ah, my longest distance so far! And I made it! I finished this one in 45 min & 46 seconds. My pace was better than last weekend, so that was cool. I ended up 24th out of 47 for my age group. I'm cool with that as there is no way I'll ever be a 6 minute pace girl. No freakin way. As always, I was just happy not to be the last person. I think there were close to a 1000 people there all together.
I spent the night at my sisters the night before. It was fun! I had to do my Proper Aunt Duties and rile up my nephew before bed. It looked like it was supposed to be 50 and partly sunny at 9am so I had high hopes. Saturday morning it was bright and sunny so I threw on some pants and a t-shirt. (Ok, I him-hawed around trying to decide what to wear) I almost put on shorts, thank goodness I didn't! My sister will tell you that I had every possible combination of clothes in my suitcase because of the stupid weather.
I found my way to the lake and had to park probably at least a 1/2 mile away. It was WINDY. Super windy. I walked to the race site while fighting the wind. I stood around for a bit and realized that I was going to need my hat and gloves, so I walked back to the car. This time walking into the wind. Fun. I got my hat, gloves and my fleece coat. Walked back and stood around a bit more.
The race was a "cannon" start and a chip finish. So, I was sporting a cool neoprene (I think) ankle bracelet with a chip on it. I ran the first two miles than walked some. The first mile was right by an open field and the wind was awful! After that, the course wound around by the lake some so it was pretty shielded by the trees. It was either starting to spinkle or the wind was picking up lake water. Either way, it felt good. I ran/walked most of mile 3 and ran quite a bit of the last mile. At this point the people running the 12 K started meeting up with us. And running MUCH faster than me. That's niiiiice. Once I could see the finish line I sped up. There were a TON of people there waiting. Totally not like the last two races.
After I finished I somehow got a water bottle put in my hand, but I don't really remember someone giving it to me. Eh well, I guzzled it. Then they had Avanti's catering sandwiches. I LOVE Avanti's bread. Yum! Some other stand had smoothies, also yum.
I decided to head back to my car at this point so I started the long walk back. Some guy drove by and asked if I wanted a ride, but I declined. After I got to my car I realized I had my hat on inside out and the stupid tag was flapping around in the wind. I had taken it off in the middle of the race and then put it back on towards the end when we got back into the windy part of it.
I drove back into Bloomington and headed to the Y. My friend Doug works there so he was going to bust me in so I could change. My legs were started to hurt at this point. I probably shouldn't have rode 1/2 hour in the car right after the race without walking around some more I guess. Live and learn. I went to lunch at a Mexican place with Doug and then headed home. My legs were REALLY starting to hurt then.
All in all it was a great little trip! I'll definitely try to do this again next year.
Some things I learned this weekend:
Do not try to drink water while running in gusty winds. You will end up with water blown all over your glasses like a flippin rainstorm and you'll have to start walking so you can wipe your glasses off. (Maybe you are right, Ang. Contacts would have been nice at that point!)
Totally gross but, runners don't really care about "niceties". Gotta spit, just do it. Gotta sniff, snort, etc(I'll spare you the sound effects). Just do it. Don't have matching clothes, who cares! People who wear spandex when they really shouldn't? They don't care! Me with my sweaty hat hair? Who cares! It's great!
Next week is the Peoria Race for the Cure!
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