My First 5K

On Saturday, I got to run my first ever official 5K (that is 3.1 miles). I know that is not a long distance to a real runner, but I had to work hard to be able to do it. It's been about a year and a half since I first started trying to run. I've been wanting to try a 5K for the last 6 months or so, I just never could find a good Saturday to try it. It seems like whenever there was a race I wanted to participate in, we were out of town or had plans or something. So, I was excited to finally have one scheduled on the calendar for October 17th. Of course I wasn't planning on it being 40 degrees outside when I signed up! So, I had to purchase some new warmer running clothes, but hopefully they will get lots of good use.
I was very excited when my friend, Debbie, decided she would run it with me. It was also her first 5K.

Here are me and Debbie freezing before the run!

Now we are in line getting ready to get started. We lined up close to the back of the pack so we wouldn't be trampled by all the "serious" runners! I did a bunch of reading online before the race, so I knew we needed to not start out too fast. I had read if you start out in the front of the pack you might try to keep up with the faster pace and then have a hard time finishing the race.

It took forever to get the race started. I'm sure it wouldn't have been bad if it wasn't so cold outside!

Finally, we are getting close to the start line.

And we're off! We were about 15 seconds behind the start of the race clock.

Todd and the kids hung out at the start/finish line during the race. They had a bouncy house for the kids to enjoy. I think there were other festivities thay got cancelled due to the cold weather. Todd snapped this picture of the finish line.

Here I am getting very excited that I can see the finish line!

I sprinted in as fast as I could at the end. It was nice to pass all those people that I had been trailing most of the race!

The time on the race clock was 33:20, but since I was about 15 seconds behind the clock, my time was 33:05. My personal goal was to run it in no more than 34 minutes, and to not stop and walk any at all during the race. I was very happy to make it in under my goal time and without walking any during the race!

My friend Debbie made it in at about 38:15.

We survived! We were so happy! We hung around after the race for the awards and door prizes. Well, I never win anything so I was shocked when they called my race number for a door prize! I won a $50 gift card that is good at several restaurants - Outback, Carrabas, etc. I'm looking forward to using that!

Now I am ready to run another one. Todd says maybe he'll start running and do it with me. That would be great!