Monday, June 01, 2009

Astros Race for the Pennant Race Report

Holy hills batman! I haven’t run this race since 2007 and wow the has route changed! Straight down Elysian and back – two hills up each way and one downhill.

How’d my race go?

Same story, different race. As always, I started out waaayyyy too fast and then lost steam at the end. My goal was to just maintain a 10 minute mile pace. It wouldn’t get me a PR, but it would be a pretty good pace for where I’m at right now. Plus, my quads were sore from my sprint out of the woods the day before (hehehehe).

About ½ way through the 1st mile, I looked down at my watch and saw that I was going at a 9:28 pace. Yeah for me, even in a 5k, that is much too fast. By the end of the 1st mile, I was at a 9:50 pace. I know I tend to maintain this kinda pace in a brick workout (for whatever reason), but just running…I dunno. I managed to maintain that pace for quite a bit of the 2nd mile too, but I walked at each water stop and it was beginning to get warm. At the end of mile 2, I was right around a 9:58 pace. The final hill is what did me in…I walked again. Grrrr! My final time was 31:10:02, a 10:03 pace. Dammit!

My parents had been entertaining both of the kids while I did my thing. They had never been in Minute Maid Park, so they seemed to be enjoying themselves. I grabbed a banana and some oranges…3 miles just didn’t seem to be enough to justify kolaches and PF Changs. :-) Next was the Kid’s K. We made the walk all the way around the stadium for the kiddos’ race and she was soooo stinkin’ excited. Well, until she saw Junction Jack – she was afraid of him! Even the munchkin freaked out when Junction Jack turned toward him…that had everyone around us cracking up.

Finally, it was time to race! The kiddo gave it her all. She got a little tired right before the turnaround. I asked her if she needed to walk for a second, so she did. But, before I knew it, she was going again. She did this one other time, but then ran as fast as she could until she was finished. She is proud of her medal and enjoyed her post-race popcorn and M&Ms.

Between the race and going to the pool in the afternoon, the kiddo was beat. She was asleep within 5 minutes of being tucked into bed. Hmmmm, maybe we should do this every weekend?

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