Full Moon 5K Run Report

I participated in the Full Moon 5K run this past Saturday evening. It's the first evening run I've done since Race Into the New Year (if that counts as an evening run). I participated in TU's graduation Saturday morning. Made the mistake of wearing my dress shoes without hose, so got a little blister on the top of my 4th little piggy (the one that had none if you do the little piggies). I was a little worried about how it would feel in my sneakers, but it wasn't bad at all. I arrived at Veteran's Park around 6:30 with my Arby's Turkey Club sandwich in hand...dinner ya know. The band Zed Lepplin was already playing. It was a nice relaxed atmosphere. I was feeling pretty excited about the possibility of setting a new PR. My friend and fellow Runners World member, Terrie, joined me and we took in all the environment. As Terrie decided to check out the potty facilities Bobby and Susan tried to sneak up on me, but they didn't realize that I have incredible awareness of my surroundings so their attempt failed. We all hung out. It was a very nice evening. Overcast and about 65 degrees...a great evening for a run.

Before I knew it the 1 mile fun run was off. So my anxiety really began to kick in. It is the part of the running events I hate...that feeling of needing to puke because there are so many people around me. It is somewhat like claustrophobia I imagine, but I have such anxiety of being around so many people I don't know. I took my race photo (see above) before we headed off. It was an easy out and back route. I actually heard the gun for this run and I was ready. Once I crossed the starting mat I began trotting along trying not to get sucked in to everyone else's adrenaline. I have to say Terrie did awesome...she got sucked in...but she did her first mile in about 9:30. I just kept looking at the Garmin trying to keep around an 11:30 pace so that I could get a PR...I needed to finish faster than 36:49. I felt pretty good during the entire run. I heard the 2 mile chime on my watch and looked down and it read 23 something so I calculated in my head that even if I ran closer to a 12 I should finish in sub-36. Well that's when it went wrong I guess. I allowed myself to walk for 5 one-hundreths of a mile...why did I need to walk...I have no idea. Guess I'm still in recovery mode...gotta snap out of that and maintain my ability to go out and do 3 miles without a whole lot of difficulty. I mean it is challenging to do 3 miles...but it's a challenge I want to overcome on a regular basis. So here were my splits from the 5K:

Mile 1: 11:34
Mile 2: 11:36
Mile 3: 12:22
.14: 1:28
For a finishing time of 37:04.

I think my favorite part about this run, is for the entire run I was with people. For most runs I feel like I am with people for about the first mile, mile and a half, but then all the speedies take off and I wind up pretty much by myself not in a pack of people. For this run, there were people around me the entire time. I don' t know if I felt this way because of the out and back course or the amount of people running. The free beer and band at the end of the run was fun. Was all in all a great run for me despite not getting a PR.