Week Three

CrAzInEsS !!!!!

I ran in my first event this weekend!

Went to Nashville with my boyfriend, and his aunts invited me to go running with them. It wasn't until we were on our way downtown that I realized we weren't "just running," we were signed up to run a Breast Cancer 5K! Now, the fact it was a 5K didn't scare me, we've run further than that in practice, but I've never been to a running event before, much less been in one, so there was a lot to learn very quickly.

Getting signed in and getting my number and figuring out where it belonged and how to pin it to my shirt so I didn't nearly rip it off every time I moved wasn't too difficult - I just had to look around at the several hundred other runners around me.

Pre-race fitters weren't anything new, I've dealt with all that before with swimming, but I was amazed how much energy a big crowd at the starting line can suck OUT of you! But there were at least as many people cheering along the sidewalks after the first mass-lunge forward and we got thinned out a bit, that helped put some of the excitement energy back IN.

But I'm still getting the hang of running hills, and the very first leg was a very steep hill, and there were several smaller ones along the route, and there were no markers telling you how far you'd gone, all of which threw me off a good bit.

Even though it was a short course, there were two water stops. At the first one I got way more water ON me than IN me. At the second one I slowed down enough to grab a cup and gulp most of it down, but it was difficult to get around people and not slip/trip over all the crushed cups on the wet ground.
During the race my mind-talk was moving MUCH faster than I was. I was thinking about technique and trying to remember every iota my first roommate (on a full-ride track scholarship) had every said about running. And I didn't have my iPod with me, so my old swimming manta just kept going around and around in my head, "Just keep swimming, Just keep swimming, just keep swimming, swimming, swimming..." (from Finding Nemo). Also, I was telling myself that I've gone absolutely crazy, there's no way I'm going to finish this without hurting myself, if this is only 3 miles what makes me think I could ever run a 13 mile half marathon much less fantasize about a full marathon... had to get all that negative crap handled. And at the end (finishing with a respectable :32.54) I was on an adrenaline high and couldn't wait to tell my coach I'd changed my mind and wanted to run the full marathon in February! *roll eyes* Isn't it amazing how quickly one changes their mind once they realize they didn't die!?!

'Nother 5K coming up in a week and a half. Should be fun!