Well, that was fun. I finished my first ever race in one piece and nothing horrible happened along the way. The inaugural Project Athena 10K (there was a 5K and a kids 1K also) was this morning in Julia Davis Park at 8am. This was my first ever 10K, first running race ever. I was expecting to finish under 90 minutes, but I did it at 76 minutes.
The swag bag that I picked up yesterday at Shu’s was pretty nice. I thought I read online it was going to have $65 dollars of goodies in it, but I am pretty happy with the Merrell Inversion Bag (I really wanted one of these to take to the gym instead of a big backpack), Wigwam running socks with the Project Athena on the cuff, a $15 coupon to Shu’s, Sun-Rype fruit leather and some VitaFusion gummy samples. Oh and the Merrell race tech shirt is very nice too.
I work swing shift, so going to bed before midnight is pretty tough. And I never use an alarm clock to wake up in the afternoon. I always get my 7-8 hours of sleep every night. I was aiming for a 10pm bedtime, but that wasn’t going to happen. Even after 2 strong gin & tonics. I set my alarm clock for 6am. Set the coffee pot on auto brew and got my clothes all ready for the morning.
11pm I popped a melatonin.
11:30pm I added an Ambien and a Tylenol PM to the mix. Yeah. My liver and drug tolerance is toast.
Midnight-ish I am finally asleep.
5:30am I am wide awake. WTF! I have a half hour before my alarm! The BF gets up and I lay in bed until my alarm buzzes. I turn on the coffee pot since the the circuit breaker flipped off in the night. I have a banana slathered with Nutella. How people can eat that on toast, I don’t understand. I down only a cup of coffee and I start to feel the tremors of a tummy ache.
Is it silly I bought a Race-Lite-Go just for something cool to hang my race number on when I run instead of using safety pins AND have a pouch to carry my cell phone in? I also took along an Orange Hammer Gel too. Anyways…
We get to the park about 7:30. I really thought that there would have been more people running the race. I was race number 56 and there was, what, less then 250. Total bummer. I was now getting a little worried that I was going to be in last place. My tummy was not happy and my mouth was dry.
We all set off and I start slow. With that being my only speed, I moved from 2/3rds back of pack to the back 3. My tummy was still not happy and my mouth was still SO dry. A mile into it I noticed a water container that the Boise RunWalk had set out. I had to take some water (thanks!) and get on my way. I was passed by 1 girl while I had a sip. I caught back up to her but it was at mile 3. I can now see how exciting it is to spot someone up ahead make that decision to pass up to them. My tummy started to feel a little better and I did not stop to walk until mile 4.5 or so. That is so impressive given my size and ability and all. I was getting pretty tired and made sure to walk to drink my water at the water stations. There wasn’t anyone really cheering except the people involved with the race – volunteers and other racers. I did get one “Good Job” by a Team in Training coach running with 3-4 other people. At mile 5 I heard someone call out 58 minutes, so that helped me figure out how well I was doing. I couldn’t go any faster then what I did at the finish line but I did better then expected. And I did not finish last. Just 5th from last. 🙂
There was a raffle after the race with all sorts of goodies. Sunglasses, passes to paintball and a bunch of other things that were handed out before I got there. I actually got a prize! It was a family pass to the Discovery Center. I don’t have a gaggle of kids to take, but the BF can take his son and his BFF if 12-13 year old boys don’t think they are too old for the DC.
All in all, I am pretty pumped about the day. I had 2 -15 minute naps, food and a hop in the hot tub, a shower and now I am ready to hit Starbucks, PayetteBrewing, and 3 G&T’s. I am pretty sure I am going to be one of the first people to register for this race again next year.
Time to ice the knees. They are pretty stiff compared to most days.
