august15wife: ESF 5K Recap!

Don't worry - I didn't die out there on the race course! It has just taken me a while to blog...life has been crazy busy lately! Sooo...here is the race recap (just a few weeks late!)

6:25am: Woke up, five minutes before my alarm. Love when that happens. Crawled out of bed and started getting tried. Tried not to wake my hubby. Didn't work. Dressed in "race day" tank and shorts. Checked the weather. BRR! Debated wearing running pants. Really glad later that the shorts won. Made some breakfast - whole wheat toast, almond butter, banana. YUM.

7:00am: Left the house. Drove to Tampa. Sunrise was BEAUTIFUL. Tried to get a few pictures by hanging my head out the window. Hubby was more worried about the camera than my head. Typical.

7:15am: Hubby's advice all morning has been "sprint the whole thing." Hubby establishes his goal for me - 30 minutes. Tells me if I run the 5K in under 30 minutes, we can have a baby. He plays dirty. His motivating cheer the rest of the day? "RUN FOR THE BABY!" Crazy boy.

7:30am: Arrive at the race course. Say hi to friend Dom who is volunteering at the event. Love her! Check in, get race number. Try to warm up. Tummy is nervous. No bueno. Try to ignore it. Begin focusing on the blister on my foot. Hubby tells me to ignore that too. Can we just start already?

7:55am: Crowd begins to assemble at the starting line. Starting line is a yardline on a football field. Start of the race? Run across the football field. Worked pretty well actually.

8:00am: They weren't kidding when they said it was an "intimate race". About 500 runners. An old guy stands in front of us and shouts directions. He also shouts "Ready, Set, Go" to start the race. Love it.

8:01am: Running. Through. Sand. After the grassy field was some THICK sand. Not packed. At all. Remember this later.

8:05am: Finally on the "real" course. SUPRISE! It's a trail run. Totally cross country. Not prepared for this. People around me are exlaiming, "There are hills!" This is like a foreign land.

8:06am: See my husband standing beside the course, cheering me on. He has NO idea how much this meant to me!

8:07am: Pass a sign that says "2 miles". Huh? I've only been running for 7 minutes. Could I have just run the fastest mile of my life? No way. I keep running.

8:11am: Pass a sign that says "1 mile". Thoroughly confused. Then I figure it out. It's a loop. I just finished one mile. The "2 mile" sign is for the next loop around. Talk about depressing. I run on.

8:15am: The first place running is lapping me. He's almost done. He's flying. I trudge on.

8:18am: First walk break. Dangit. So much for my goal of not walking.

8:23am: Saw my husband again. Tried to get him to jump onto the course and run with me. No such luck. His foot is still too sore from his Relay last weekend. Just seeing his face gives me motivation.

8:25am: Walk again. Dangit. Make myself start running again.

And so it goes. Tried to run as much as possible, but walked more than I wanted.

8:32am: Finish my second loop. Back to the straightaway for the finish. Running my heart out. Looking for my husband. Uhoh. I'm back to the sandy part of the race. And it feels like quiksand. Just. Want. To. Finish.

8:36am: FINISH LINE! My husband is there waiting for me. Official time: 36:35. Not great. But I'm fine with it! I'll just work to be faster at the next one!