Kiss me, I'm Irish!

So the race went well!  A little slowly....but well!  We got there early and checked in, then I went and stood in line for the bathroom for about 20 minutes.  Seriously.  There were porta-potties outside but I figured I'd take advantage of the real bathrooms while I could.  Sooo.....after we got our t-shirts (really cute, by the way...they're green with a shamrock & the name of the run -- Max's O'Hartford 5k) we went outside to bask in the sunlight.  It was a little cool (around 45?) but the sun was bright and felt so good.  We mingled outside with lots of other people and checked out everybody else's costumes/gear.  Some were very creative, some were downright scary!  Me, I just had my Irish firefighter wife t-shirt on and some St. Patrick's Day socks. 

Once we were outside I was a texting fool with my friend Nikki, who was meeting us there along with her sister. (We were texting to find out where each other was..."I'm in line for the bathroom"...."We're in the lobby"...."We're by the orange blow-up thingy.")  lol  We hung out for a bit, talking, & laughing until race time. 

The race itself went fine, I was slower than I had hoped (38.5 mins overall) but I did run/jog the entire time.  And that was my goal.  I knew I could run that distance for sure (I've run further on the treadmill) and just wanted to prove it to myself.  The funniest part was as we're running, they have staff along the sides to let you know how far you've come.  So we've been running for what felt like FOREVER (seriously....forever) and this guy, a staffer, hollers "1 mile!! Great job!! 1 mile!"   I wanted to punch him in the larynx.  Jerry turned to me and said, "Okay...one mile....we're running about a 14-minute mile."  I was like WHAT?!  That irritated me...not Jerry himself, just the fact that I was running so much slower...just last weekend we had run 3 miles on the trail and had done a 12-minute mile.  Still not fast but faster than 14 mins!  lol  So after that I wanted to pick up the pace a little bit but not go crazy, because I knew I had to still run 2 miles. Jerry was great and ran with me the entire time....he's done a LOT of 5ks and can run 3.1 miles in no time but he stayed right with me, which I appreciated.  

The race, being in downtown Hartford, was fairly flat....there were a few slight hills, enough to make you notice the incline both in your calves and your breathing....but nothing too bad. The coolest part was as we were nearing the end, you run by the state Capitol, right in front of it so that was pretty neat.  Towards the end there were also people cheering for you, saying, "you're doing a great job! You're almost there!"  I thought that was funny & moving both at the same time.  As we rounded the corner we could see the finish line so we started picking up the pace to finish strong.  It felt great to actually finish! I wanted to cheer and cry at the same time.  It was moving in a way because I couldn't believe I had actually just ran a 5k...just 4 months after I started this journey.

So what now?  It's almost a letdown the day after....but it was back to the grind today.  Jerry & I went to our regular gym -- the owner gave him a key!  How cool is that!? So we got there at 4:30am and I did some interval training on the treadmill for a half-hour then a quick weight set.  I really didn't feel like getting up today but I knew I'd be disappointed if I didn't go so I'm glad I did.  I did feel better after going. 

We're looking for our next 5k, there's a ton of them in CT so we shouldn't have trouble finding another one.  I'd like to do at least a couple more before the big one in September (the NYC one) and really concentrate on building my speed before then.