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Thursday, November 24, 2011

Clearwater Turkey Trot RR

I am on cloud nine. OMG I feel awesome!!!!

Ok trying to do a full RR...

I ran in my first ever race today: The Clearwater (FL) Turkey Trot one mile gobbler. Last night I could not sleep, I tossed and turned and had a queasy stomach. When I did sleep, I dreamt of running. Anyhow, I got up around 6ish and was ready to be out the door at 6:30. We got over to Clearwater about 7:20ish and parked in a friend's driveway about 100 yards from the start line. The place was crowded but not too chaotic so we went into the Clearwater high school stadium to pick up our race t-shirts (really nice gray running non-cotton technical shirt). It didn't take too long for me to be at the starting line for an 8:30 start. My hubby (who ran the 10K) waited with me until the national anthem and then he joined the 10K start line. I was so pumped to go...as soon as I lined up I knew I wasn't going to finish last. A lot of families in jeans and flip flops with kids in wagons and dogs on leashes were also lining up. So I knew goal 1 was going to be met no problem. I put my headphones in and turned on my i-pod and the Olympic theme song pulsed through my ears as the crowd counted down to the starting gun. As soon as the gun went off, we surged forward. Took me about a hundred feet to get around the walkers before I could start my stride and at that point Adele's "Rolling In the Deep" came through my ears and I was gone. I felt so good running and hearing the crowd cheering us on. I think I had a stupid grin on my face from start to finish. It didn't take too long for the crowd to make the turn back towards the high school and there was a bagpipe band playing for us as we ran into the stadium (that was AWESOME). I entered the stadium as Black Eyed Peas "I Gotta Feeling" came on my i-pod and I just had to start running again (there was a slight uphill just before the school that I walked). I dont even remember my feet touching the ground as I came around the corner and spotted the finish line...I had felt good but when I looked up and saw 12:30 on the time I nearly freaked out in the last stretch. I crossed the finish line with a time according to Endomondo at 12:49, which shattered my training times on the mile by more than 2 minutes. I didnt feel sore or achy at all in any of my muscles including my knees, which have been bothering me. I felt like the whole race had flown by and I could have kept going easily. As I crossed the finish line, there were still people finishing the 5k in 1:30:00...

I am still riding on cloud 9...I felt so good finishing the race and even as the adrenaline is coming down, I still feel awesome....definitely going to do a 5k by March and the Marine Corps 10K in DC in October definitely seems up my alley. It's amazing that two weeks ago, I didn't think i could do this and now I feel like I could do anything.

I am now a runner!!!

Going into this race I had two goals: to not finish last and to have around a 14:00 min time (which was faster than anything i had done in the past).

I shattered both of my goals and BOY does it feel good!

3 comments:

  1. I'm quite proud of you! And yes, you are a RUNNER!

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  2. HUGE Congrats to smashing your goals! You did excellent. I was so happy for you when I first saw it on dailymile

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