Tag: race

GREW From the Vines 5K- Recap

A top 20 finish! I got lost! Have I peaked your interest? 🙂

Having been feeling under the weather for a week, hearing the alarm go off on Saturday morning was rough. It was cold outside, I was tired and my bed was so warm. What was I thinking? Oh I know, it was my pride. I wanted to prove to myself that even feeling crappy all the time, I could still pull a 30 minute 5K in a race. Stupid, I know. Since it was a cold morning and I was fearing asthma issues, I layered up in clothing. Yes, I know it’s cold air I breathe in that causes my issues but I just felt like the layers helped me be mentally prepared. As I still wasn’t feeling great I told myself 31 minutes would be a good adjustment. Like that made a huge difference. Head games, much?It was a smaller local race so I headed out around 8:15 for a 9:00 start time. My mom and the puppy were with me as well. I knew what winery it was at and its general location. Driving out I never saw any signs that said Villa 46, we came up on another winery that I had a run a race at and I knew that we had gone to far. We turned around and headed back the other way, this time paying attention to the street numbers. We find what we are looking for but it says Villa Toscana… and we couldn’t pull in the main drive. Continuing on a little farther we found a delivery driveway with yet another name but same street numbers. We pulled in there and parked next to some trucks that had already parked. Seeing the number of cars parked and then seeing the page of pre-registered runners confirmed that this was going to be the smallest race I have ever run. Only 17 people pre-registered. I think we barely hit 20 by start time. After a little announcement, a race volunteer told us there would be kids guiding us at each turn so we wouldn’t get lost. He also mentioned staying inside the fence. Then we were off! The first mile started on a dirt road but it fairly flat and wide so it was easy to run on. The kids directed us right and we headed out towards the street. As we got to the street I saw an arrow pointing right again but it kind of looked like it was telling us to run on the uneven grass. That didn’t seem right and everyone was running on the street so I followed. Let me clarify that the grass was on the inside of the fence.

As we ran down the street, we passed the delivery driveway. Some people turned up it only to turn around and run back to the street. A volunteer was yelling something towards us but we couldn’t hear him. A group of us chatted, figured they told us to stay on the street and all kept running towards the main driveway. Turned in there, headed back across the start line and back to the first Y. This time the kids sent us left. Mile 1- 9:22. I was feeling good so I was very happy with that time.

Then mile 2 came. Going left this time sent us down into the vineyard. Gorgeous views but I have run trails up mountains that had better maintained paths than that. I should have worn my trail shoes. By now I had decided to try to pace a tall guy wearing red in front of me and a woman in front of him. Then the inclines started. Ok, all were less than 100 ft but all were short and steep and on loose ground riddled with divets. I know I have maintained an average base lately but I don’t have it in me to run hills right now. However, I can power walk them faster than I can run them. So that is what I did. I lost red shirt here but was able to pass the woman who was struggling with the climb too. From there it was another small climb and out on a grassy section. Mile 2- 10:54. Ouch.

Mile 3 led us around another set of vines and through the actual vines. Have you ever tried to run between vines? It’s hard! Then a little down hill section that I flew down before heading back to the first set of vines. This is where I passed a woman in blue, caught up to red shirt and passed him too. I could have sworn we were going right and up that hill again but the kids waved us left. Wait, what? We should be close to done not running the opposite way of the start line!

I was also way too damn hot. Capri’s and long sleeves were way too much for high 50’s. I passed a guy in white shirt before rounding a corner and another little incline. Red shirt caught back up. No! I sped up. Another trek between two vines and it was up the last biggest hill and back towards the start. I briefly checked my watch because I knew I had to be close to 30. 32:something, ugh.Then I noticed the mileage. 3.2 miles and I still had more to go. What?! Rounded a corner to the start and a woman waved me on through another gate and up the main drive way and finally to the finish. Finaltime- around 34:4? It took me a moment to stop my Garmin. Finalmileage- 3.44. My mileage was echoed by other runners watches as well. According to my mother I was the second woman across the finish line.

So no, I did not hit the arbitrary time goal that I had set myself. But I felt good throughout the race, my lungs and my stomach behaved for the entire thing. And I passed people!!!! It has been so long since I have done that, it felt kind of awesome. Childish, I know, but still awesome. 🙂 The finish line was kind of gorgeous so we took enjoyed the scenery for a while before heading home. There was a man who ran the race with his chocolate lab so we let Zoey and her meet. Zoey was so excited to meet a dog that wanted to play and not attack her. The lab was small for the breed and super sweet. She put up with Zoey’s hyper level well. So it was a good morning all around! 🙂

Can you guess where we all got lost? The kids did a good job directing us which way to go. However there were no kids at the corner where we went on to the street. When we were supposed to stay inside the fence. Yeah. Oops. Poor listening skills aside, getting lost driving there as well, it was still a good race. I felt a little bad for the poor turn out. I hope they try it again next year. This time, I’ll wear my trail shoes. Oh and blogger fail, I didn’t go back down into the vineyard to get pictures of the course.

Ever get lost at a race? This makes my 3rd time.

Ever run a super tiny race?

A Little Predicament

My next race is now less than 5 days away. It’s actually the very first race I ran and one of my favorite races- the HOB Fun Run. Also a little nerve wracking because it’s one race where I see a lot of people I know. Performance anxiety!! This will be my fifth year running it. The first 3 years I ran the 5k and last year I was a little crazy. I ran the 10k… and then the 5k. The 10k was a PR (55:57) at the time and the 5k was run with C and her husband.

Originally my plan was to warm up for a mile, run the 10k, run the 5k. That would bring me to 10 miles and I was going to treat that as the last double digit run before the City to the Sea half. This year with my lovely GI issues (and no City to the Sea), I am torn on what to run. I want to be just as crazy as I was last year. Question is can I reign myself in, take it easy and still have fun? The way I see it I have three options-

A- Run the 10k-easy, spectate the 5k
B- Skip the 10k, run the 5k-moderatly
C- Run both and practice pacing and breathing

Thing is, the 10k has an unofficial time limit of 1:15:00. Both races have a loop course, the 5k is one loop and the 10k is two loops. The 5k starts at 9:15 and the 10k at 8:00. If I take it easy on the 10k, I am hoping that would be around 1:01-1:03 ish. Which would give me 10 minutes to stretch and hydrate. I know I can finish the miles, the question is how well and will it be fun. I have friends running the 5k as well. If I run with C and her husband, it’ll be around a 30 minute 5k- last year was 30:22- assuming I can stay with them. I also have one friend running a little slower than that, and a couple more that will be run/ walking with a stroller. So I have plenty of people to run the 5k with no matter the pace.

I am working the late registration/ packet pick up table on Saturday so I have until then to decide. So help me out!

What are your thoughts?

Ever run a race 5 years in a row?

Ever run back to back races?

Wild Run 5K recap

I hope everyone had a good 4^th of July!

Wild Run 5K brought a couple of firsts for me. One was a rare opportunity due to the race size and something I never thought would happen. What I am most proud of was that I ran a smart race from start to finish-negative splits and all.

Choosing the Wild Run 5k, I knew it was going to be a smaller race and I was a little leery considering the past experiences that I had with races put on by this gym. However, I was pleasantly surprised-for the most part. Packet pick up was a breeze on Thursday. Parking was in the zoo parking lot so super simple. Previous races by this gym had a spray painted starting line, a megaphone start, and an orange cone finish line. So I was impressed to see tents set up, an emcee leading a warm up and a designated start. Granted it was pop-up tent but still a huge improvement. There were about 100 runners for the 10k and 5K combined. A little smaller than even I was previously thinking. The only glitch I saw prior to the race was the start time. I had confirmed that the start time for the 5K was 8:10 but the schedule on the board said 8:30. Umm? Turns out 8:10 was correct.

It was go time and we were off. After looking at the map the previous night, I saw that the first ½ mile of the race had a hill and the last ¾ of a mile were on the lake path that I run. Everything in between was a mystery but for the most part was pretty flat. I started off in the middle of the pack like I always do. We ran through the parking lot to the lot of the baseball field nearby and then up the street. We were still running in a pack when we hit the hill. It wasn’t the elevation, less 100 ft., but it was short and vertical. I walked near the top. .3 miles in and I was walking, waah. It was short, about 20 seconds and then I was running again. I pulled away from the pack and there were only a couple people in front of me. I figured that wouldn’t last long so I may as well enjoy it. After that small hill, it was flat, yay! My watch buzzed at mile 1 -9:37. Ouch, I knew I wasn’t in top shape speed wise, but I was hoping for better than that. I knew I could pick it up so I that is what I tried to do. I kept a guy pushing stroller in my sights. He seemed super comfortable at that pace so I knew I probably couldn’t catch him so I tried to always be able to see him.

I heard someone coming up behind me and that gave me the incentive to run faster. They fell back and I kept going. Rounding a corner I found the only water station but I didn’t need it. I managed to pass a guy in blue shirt here. I just kept watching stroller guy. We went right and there were some rolling hills. The elevation was almost negligible it was just that there was like 6 of them in a row. Stroller guy got farther away. No! So I picked it up again. Mile 2-9:00. A little more street and we were back to the lake path. I knew the path well so I was hoping to pick it up but I wasn’t going to look at my watch again. This was also where I started to realize that no one had passed me yet, I also hadn’t seen another woman since the start of the race. As I was coming up on one of the bridges on the trail, a biker rode past me and then the 10K leader thundered past. I got hung up right before the bridge, 2 women and 4 dogs were in the path. I had to walk the little bridge until I got around them. Then I had like .3 of a mile to go. My goal was to finish strong and not let anyone pass me. Usually I am dragging and breathing hard by the end of a 5K but I felt like I had the energy for a final kick, so I kicked. Mile 3- 8:30.

Finish time -27:48

Hot damn, that’s a new PR! Not by much, but it still counts. Here’s where it got really interesting. I was the first female 5K finisher. What?! Seriously? How is that possible? Another woman finished about a minute behind me. She looked hardcore, how did I pull this off? I was super excited and a little bit in shock. I realize that it’s because it was such a small race but it’s still a huge pick me up after I had a few rough races.

Post finish- not sure what I am doing here

While waiting for the awards ceremony, we got to cheer on the other runners coming in. There were people finishing for the 10K, 5K and 1 mile. The kids running were so adorable. But hands down the coolest finisher was an 85 year old woman with a walker. She completed the 1 mile course. Talk about awesome.

This is also where they kind of fell apart. They were having computer issues so the awards were delayed; so delayed that quite a few people went home. When they finally started announcing, there were so few people there. The awards were for 1-3 male and female for each race. When they announced my name they also announced my time as 24:48. Ha! I wish!

Even with it’s little issues, it was a good race and a fun morning. Well outside of one thing. For whatever reasons, my iPhone had a little glitch. I ran the entire 5K with one song playing repeatedly. 27 minutes of Wrecking Ball over and over and over. I deserve props for not chucking my phone. I came pretty close. 🙂

How was your weekend?

Did you have good 4th?

Bands on the Run- Recap

This morning was the 2nd annual Bands on the Run. I passed on it last year, for some reason that I cannot remember, so I was looking forward to it this year. The premise is a 5K/10K/half marathon run mostly on the beach with music along the way. I had originally planned on running the half but made the smart decision to run the 10K. I was tired when I made the decision a few weeks ago and May truly kicked my butt. As I mentioned in my last post, I felt completely unprepared for today’s race. To compound matters, I broke one of my own rules last night and ate pizza for dinner and I mean I ate pizza. Bad move! Never before a race!

I picked up my packet yesterday and other than not being sure where to go, it was a breeze. They had everything ready to go and packaged, even the safety pins. As I got ready this morning, I felt predictably a little ill- my own fault- but I was trying to pump myself up. So out came the bright green and pink compression socks. The shorts I had wanted to wear were dirty-oops- so I randomly chose another pair. I was flying solo this race, so I had an available passenger seat. They make a great staging area. Please tell me someone else has done this?

After I arrived and parked, I was using the extra time to apply a little body glide. I saw movement out of the corner of my eye and a runner was getting something out of his passenger seat right next to me. A little awkward but we’re all runners right? He then sat on the curb to work on his feet and asked which race I was doing. Me, being my usual smart ass self said that I was lazy and running the 10k. Then he told me he was running the 10K, too. Open mouth, insert foot. 😦 I then slunk off to the starting line in shame. Fail!

no talent for an action shot during the race but how about one while I walk?

I knew that the chances of this being a PR race were slim to nil but I went in with 2 goals. Of course the first, the impossible goal was to PR. That would have meant 55:00 and below. The second more realistic goal was to finish under an hour. There were the usual pre-race announcements and a little music played and then it was go time. The 10K and the half started at 8:30. Somehow, I found myself near the front of the pack. Oops.

The race course started in the football stadium of a nearby high school before heading out to the beach. We crossed the starting line and ran about a 1/3 of the track before heading towards the parking lot. From there it was onto a side path that turned into a trail through a tunnel of cypress trees. 3/4 of a mile in, we hit the first band- the high school drum line. I admit I love drum lines so it was cool running through them. Then was the first patch of soft sand. Ugh. It was only about 150 yards so I ran slowly through it. However to get to the beach, you had to go through the dunes. I tried to run, I really did but I just kept sinking, so finally I starting walking and tried to flat foot it across. I had so much sand in shoes. After finally making it to the hard pack, we had 2 miles out and 2 miles back. This is also where the 5K runners went right and the 10K and half runners went left. As we split up we were serenaded by hula dancers. That’s not the right word, but what would it be?

I love running on the hard pack, but I just could not seem to pick up the pace. I was getting frustrated with myself. Mile 2 ran us past 2 guys with guitars. Coming up on mile 3, I still hadn’t seen the leaders pass me on the way back so I was trying to tell myself I could pick up the pace. Then they passed. I think there was a band of some sort at the turn around but I can’t remember. 😦 Turning around I was still kind of cranky but soon had to snap out of it. This was the friendliest race I have run. Everyone was smiling and waving to each other and shouting out props as the runners ran back to the start. How can you be cranky with that? Plus there was this-

I was tiring on the way back and I knew I still had the dunes to go across again. Dune sand sucks. Literally and figuratively. It pulls your feet down and leaves you with sand in shoes as a parting gift. Once again, I walked most of it. I felt goal B slipping away around mile 5 and I became irritated with myself again. I pushed on back through the cypress tunnel and the side path and I was finally back at the school. I took a short walk break before rounding the corner to the football field and running the last 2/3 of the track to the finish line. I honestly hadn’t been paying attention to my watch other than mile splits, so when I rounded the track to the finish line I saw that the clock said 59:00. Seriously?! Run!!! I hauled butt down to the line. Official time- 59:28.

I walked a bit of the track cooling down before heading to the grass to stretch out. I also wanted to lose the 5 pounds of sand in my shoes. While I was dumping the shoe sand into the trash, a guy came up and asked what time I had finished in. Apparently he had used me to pace himself through the race. Really? That’s a first. I think my socks made me easy to spot. 🙂 I was thinking about my time while stretching and I think this is my second slowest 10K. 🙂 I headed over to check the race stats just to see before heading home. Ummm, what? I placed 2nd in my age group. Sweet! I hung around a little longer before heading home. The wind was picking up and I was a little chilled.

A few things I loved about this race- the volunteers all wore shirts that said “I’m with the Band”. Any spot in the trail sections that might trip you up, a branch, a root, a rock, etc. was spray painted fluorescent orange. Thanks for looking out! The drum line- seriously, I got to run through it twice. The start was well organized and the volunteers very helpful. The giant timing clock rocked-

I’ve had time to think about it and I could have run faster. I know I said I felt like I couldn’t but I felt fine after the race, a little too fine. There was more left in the tank, I just need to utilize it better. The difference between me and the woman who placed first in our age group was less than 2 minutes. It is ok to get a little winded in a race, I think I forgot about that.

Overall, goal 2 was accomplished and it was a good race. The weather was great and the course amazing. It will definitely be on my list of races to run again.

Thoughts on running through dune sand?

What about drum lines?

Someone Kick Me

I had good intentions about getting in some really good runs over the long weekend. You know what that saying about good intentions? Yeah. I had hoped to run a few miles Sunday evening after the hike but it didn’t happen. There was some drama with the mother’s puppy and that made a perfect excuse. Monday was a day off from work, perfect opportunity to get in some miles, but nope, saw Godzilla instead. May has been a pretty off month for me; I am kind of nervous for my race on Saturday. I feel completely unprepared and it’s just the 10K. I am so glad I didn’t sign up for the half this time around.

I did get in a few miles after work on Tuesday. But honestly, starting in 96º was not the best idea. 4 miles turned into a 5K, a slow, hot 5K. I ran at the lake so I am still walking the construction section and I was so thankful for those walk breaks. I even tried to take a picture to show how hot I was. I felt like I was panting like a dog, ugh.

Speaking of dogs, my mom had a banquet thing for tennis, so I hung out with the puppy for a bit after my run. She got hurt on Sunday trying to protect her yard and had to go back to the vet Tuesday. She does not like her medicine. Plus she is sad that she can’t play with her toys for a few weeks. 😦 We just chilled on the patio. She would doze off next to me, then wake up to see if I was still there. It was kind of cute. 🙂

I once again hit the path for a few miles tonight. 4.5 sluggish miles. The goal was a nice, easy pace of 10:00. Pace met, but it didn’t feel easy. I don’t know why running feels so hard lately. I haven’t even run over 6 miles since my last half marathon. Apparently May is synonymous with Slacker. I was very happy to see the walking sections tonight as well. But sooner rather than later, they will finish the construction and I will no longer be able to rationalize the walking so easily. Wah Wah. I really need to kick this- whatever this is.

Ok, it no longer be called a lake — Ok, it can no longer be called a lake

Tomorrow I hope to get to packet pickup for the race on Saturday. It’ll be tight with work but I think I can make it. Less stress for race morning then. 🙂 Is it too much to hope that this race will be the kick in the pants I need? And a cookie counts as carb loading right? Now if I can just hold myself to 1.

How has your week been?

Anyone else have a rough month or so of training?

What are your weekend plans?