Thursday, July 4, 2013

Milltown Firecracker 5K Race Recap

This was a doozy!

I was running this with my friend Kristin.  Both of us were nervous because neither of us was in our top racing form.  She has always been much faster than me and is in better shape than me in general, so when she was nervous I became much more nervous!  She tried out the course a few days before the race and struggled with it which added to my apprehension but I said, let's see what happens!  I trained for a total of 2 days for this race, I was sore from the prep time (or lack thereof, however you want to look at it), there was going to be 92% humidity while we were running, and there were lots of hills which I have never run on.  Ever.  What could possibly go wrong?! *note the sarcasam*

The Night Before

Since this race was an hour away from my house Kristin picked up my registration packet (or "death bag" as she coined it) for me.  I spent the night at my mom's house and when I got my racing bib I was happy to see that my racing number was 308.  This was the number of the house I "grew up" in in Old Bridge.  I put grew up in in quotation marks because we didn't move into this house until I was 15 but it was the first house that our family bought after years of apartment living, it was the house where we had so much fun, it was the house that all of our friends hung out at.  Swinging door policy there - there was never a day or night when someone wasn't over and it was awesome. When I saw that number I breathed a slight sigh of relief, hoping it was a good omen for the next morning. 

Getting Started

Off to a bad start as usual - I snoozed through my alarm for about half an hour, leaving only half an hour to get ready.  Typical, but not the end of the world.  I didn't have a good night of sleep because my mother's upstairs neighbor was walking around late at night, sounds I am not used to anymore especially since we don't even have an upstairs level to our house.  On top of that, the neighbor has 2 small dogs, so in the middle of the night while they were prancing around, my half-asleep mind thought I was hearing my children coming into my bedroom so every time they walked, I woke up.

I have been using a Keurig for so long now that I think I have forgotten how to make coffee.  What I made in my mother's regular coffee pot was absolutely awful so I couldn't drink it.  My usual pre-race bagel for breakfast wasn't sitting too well with me either so I didn't eat all of it and instead for the first time I grabbed a Gatorade "Prime" sports fuel pack.  I had a Fruit Punch flavored one and that sat much better in my stomach than any food did though I was still hoping there would be time for a bathroom break before the race. 

I actually didn't do too bad for time but we were a little later than we had hoped.  We walked to the park where the race was starting from Kristin's house and as we got to the park entrance, we saw that there was already a large group of people lined up and an announ
cer was counting down the start!  Were we really that late?!  Were we actually going to miss the race?!  Like idiots we started running toward the crowd that was now running directly at us, only to realize...it was the fun run.  Yup.  We just tried to run to catch the start line of the fun run.  *smh*

There was still time for a bathroom break but they were the oh so lovely port-a-johns.  And they only had 2 unlocked.  And one of them had a seat covered with...well...poop.  I don't know how you even do that.  So one john for hundreds of racers.  We spent the rest of our time before the race on line for the bathroom.  We barely made it to the starting line but we did it.  This start was strange to me...maybe I just didn't hear it, but the announcer didn't count us down, he just said to get ready and a few minutes passed us by and he said nothing else.  Then seemigly out of the blue the gun went off and we got started!

Setting The Pace

Pace was difficult for me.  I mean, it usually is anyway btu this time it was different.  The start was hard because I felt like it took a long time for everyone to spread out and it was probably because the first thing you do is run up a hill, lol.  I stayed with Kristin for almost the first mile which I was happy with because I know she's a fast runner.  Checking my stats, my first mile was done in 9:39, which is average for where I was when I actually WAS running, haha.  And then when I did slow down, I was still able to see Kristin ahead of me.  I kept thinking that if I can see her, maybe I'll be able to dig deep and catch up with her again.  And then we hit a monstrous hill.  OK, so it wasn't monstrous.  And it wasn't even the biggest hill in the race.  We hit that probably about a mile or so in.  But somewhere around 2 miles is when I HAD to slow even more.  I am not proud, but I had to walk up the rest of the hills.  I tried as hard as I could to run them but it was just too much.  And in all honesty, at that point there probably wasn't much of a difference between my running and walking speed anyway.  So, adios Goal #1 - to finish without walking.

Relief Along The Way

Today was hot.  And the humidity was killer.  It was like trying to breathe with a hot, wet sponge over your face.  I am not used to that at all!  One of the things that I did like about this race is that the residents of Milltown really like to get involved with it.  Not only were there additional water stations courtesy of random people standing in front of their houses, but other stood outside with hoses or sprinklers for us to run through and for that I am very grateful.  I don't know how I would have done if I didn't get to run through a few hoses!  One person was handing out shots of vodka...no thank you.  Not only am I running, but it's 8:00 in the morning!  Fun that they would offer though!

There was one guy who was running completely barefoot.  I don't know why.  I get that some people have a theory about being natural and feeling the earth and the impact to your body and it protects something, blah, blah, blah, but even they wear a type of shoe for that. Before the 2 mile mark I passed no shoe guy because he was walking as well.  I don't know how he even did that because the soles of my feet were burning from the hot blacktop...and I was wearing socks & sneakers!  To each their own I guess, right?  I hope his feet are OK!

Finishing

This was a tough course for me for about a million reasons.  My MapMyRun time read 35:40 and the official time was 35:43.  Both are my worst time to date.  Including my first ever 5K while training last year.  So adios Goal #2 - to finish in under 35:00 (originally it was 32:00 but I changed it yesterday).

Bel = 0, The Race = 1.  We need to fix this!

While I am disappointed in both my time & my performance, I am still proud of myself.  I never stopped even though there were PLENTY of times I wanted to.  I could hear my body screaming at me and my mind screaming at me, "Just sit down for a minute!" and I never did.  Yes I walked but I didn't stop moving.  I was afraid of this run and totally unprepared but I did it anyway and I survived.  So there's the silver lining :)

Oh, I also forgot to mention that this was my first race with one of those chips attached to the bib, so yay for that!  I like it when the MMR time is that close to the actual time :)

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