The Blizzard that Wasn't and the 5K that Was

Hey! I hate that the weekend is nearly over.....blah

So anyway, Friday night after work we headed out the door and it was.....raining. But a slightly chunky rain and the temp was borderline freezing. Since it was supposed to be a nasty night we grabbed some yummy burritos and headed home. Not too long after we got home the rain turned to light snow, but there wasn't much of it. Just as we sat down to watch a movie (something we rarely get to do!) my brother (who lives in Cincy, OH) called. My phone rang ans since we were watching a movie I didn't get up to get it. But then it rang again right away, so I thought someone must need something. By the time I found my phone it had gone to voicemail already and Brent's phone started ringing. It was my brother, with questions about what type of digital camera to buy. Grrrrr. Obviously not life and death. I can't stand being interrupted when we're eating or in the middle of something, esp people who dial and dial and dial just because they're bored. Start running! Get a hobby! 1 hour and 11 minutes later it was way to late to get back to our movie. Hmmm. Better luck next year. AND, the snow had turned to rain so now there was no snow left. We got all our race stuff together, made some new running mixes and got to bed.

We woke up to no real snow on the ground, but there was a decent amount of snow falling here, and it was really starting to stick to the grass. Yeah!! I had done all kinds of research on what the temps would be at race time - 10 am. It was SUPPOSED to be about 30, cloudy, with winds making it feel like 25. Brrrr! Since the snow was really falling now I had no reason not to believe that. We dressed warmly, ate some oatmeal, and headed out the door. 4 miles closer into the city and there wasn't a snowflake to be bought. Insane! Our grass was totally coated by the time we left, but it looked like a complete rain event in the city limits. And to top it off, the sun was starting to coming out and it was downright sunny when we made it the 19 miles to downtown. We parked in a garage walked a few blocks over to the arena and got our race packet. The website had said there were 1200 preregistered, and there were a ton of people there already. Because it was a pretty big race plus parking can be a bear sometimes, we had gotten there pretty early so we still had about 40 minutes to kill after we got all checked in and everything. We walked around analysing the crowd. There were a LOT of non-runners. A ton of jeans and several random sweatbands. It was a strange mix of the 1980's. We ran around the block once to warm-up and lined up in the middle. We always start next to each other and then go our separate ways. I knew Brent would be faster, so at the start he was off on my right. I also knew there would be quite a few hills spaced throughout so I set off pacing myself slowly.

The large crowd moved well, and I can't complain about anyone walking or clogging up the start, excellent!! We headed down the blvd, past all the honkey tonks that were strangely silent. It was so weird to pass them early in the morning before all the aspiring stars are belting tunes out the open club doors, and before the REALLY aspiring singers are camped out on the sidewalks with their guitars. I was instantly SO warm. I had dressed for 25, and was certainly closer to the upper 30's. I hate being overheated like that!!! I tried not to think about it, but my ipod was too quiet and with my stupid gloves on it wouldn't register my fingers trying to crank it up. I hit the first mile around 8.40, I was pleased with that. I could still see Brent just a little ahead of me, running well. We wound our way through downtown, past various auditoriums and clubs turning to make our way back around toward the arena. At the end of mile 2 we started a forever long ascent. The hill was steep and a lot of people had stopped and were walking. A girl was off to the side puking and I couldn't look because I could've easily been there with her. I was SO warm but it seemed like it would take too much effort to take of my gloves or earwrap. Just when I thought I couldn't take it anymore we made it to the top! YEAH!! I could still see Brent plodding on up ahead, but we started making several turns and he was gone...I hit mile 2 in 17-something. My Garmin says my Mile 2 was 5.44. Impressive, esp with that hill. I think it had some trouble with the tall buildings! Mile 3 started out with an awesome downhill, I sped it up a bit and really started feeling stronger. I was dealing with the 'heat' and took advantage of the downhill and gained some momentum afterwards. From there it wasn't far back to the arena, and I was able to sped up a little bit until the end when it was slightly uphill and I just didn't have much of a kick left for the finish line. Brent was waiting for me in the finisher's area, this was the first time he's beaten since our very first 5K when he outsprinted me to the finish in June 2004. So it's quite the coup. My finish time was 26.45, which is my slowest 5K time since August 2005. But that's OK, after last week's run at 27.30 I wasn't sure I would even be able to beat 27 since this was a much more difficult race.

In the finisher's area there were people dry heaving, hacking and puking everyone. It was pretty gross and since I'm pretty close to vomit status at the end of every race I had to get out of there!! We went inside and grabbed some water and tiny bananas (seriously, they were so small). We hung around to check out the official results and then headed out. I was the 60th female finisher, 206th overall and 13th in my division of 70 runners (25-29 Female)! Not bad!! Not my best by a long shot but not bad stats either.

From there we headed to the local running store to buy some new shoes for me! My Pearls had 600 miles on them and it was time to retire them. I really didn't like them that much so I decided to go back to Mizunos and got the Wave Inspires. I tried them out on the treadmill for 6 miles today and they feel much better. They're just a simpler shoe.

The game last night was fun. We had strange seats right behind the goal. At 5'2 it's hard for me to see around people anyway, but this made it nearly impossible to see the goal. The seats just weren't slanted enough to really give you a height advantage for the row in front of you. The Preds won 5-2. We were right next to the CMT band stage that played during the breaks between periods, and as such I got on the jumbotron during some of those shots. Yeah!! Brent had a lot of fun yelling the "aspiring artist's" name (Trent something or another) numerous times throughout their performance. We had a good time and walked down to an Italian place for a late dinner. Our waitress was the worse waitress known to man. We asked her for silverware and she never brought it. It took about 15 minutes before she ever brought us any water. We ended up stealing some from an empty table. People who got there 30-45 minutes after us had bread, salad and their food way before we did. We won't be going back.....ever. The food was OK but not spectacular.





So, we didn't get much snow this weekend but if you do want to see some snow pics you can visit Shore Turtle, Danny, Jeanne or Susie! They have tons and tons of glorious snow. It looks like so much fun! We got a little snow this afternoon and decided to go out for a walk with Pippin and enjoy it. I found a 5K in May that's for people and dogs and today was to be training day #1 for Team Rachel and Pippin. We started with a walk for .6 miles at an 18 min/mile pace (I wore my Garmin) then we started jogging around a 10.30 for .4 miles - it was really, really snowing then and blowing in our faces - v tough! A guy running passed us in shorts and a T-shirt! It was 29 degrees!! We turned around and ran for .3 miles at a 9.37 - awesome!!! Pippin was probably going so fast because it was snowing so much and he wanted to go home. We walked another .2 mile at a 15 min/mile pace, and then ran the last .3 back around a 10.30 pace. It was going back into the heavy snow and it was piling up on Pippin's little smashed face. He was not happy!! He wouldn't stand outside for pictures so I just let him go back in and Brent and I played for a while. He did really well, and then wanted to play ball once we got back in so he wasn't a bit tired!

Does tomorrow HAVE to be Monday???

Rachel

Exercise-
Thurs - 1 mile am walk with Pippin and Brent, 2 mile pm walk with Pippin and Brent, 50 minutes toning/stretching
Fri - rest day (too cold to walk!! 27 and it felt much colder!)
Sat - 5K race
Sun - 6 miles treadmill, almost 2 mile run with PIPPIN!